HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1987-10-14, Page 24PAGE 24. THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1987.
You can't get a licence for sex in Ontario
How do you feel about SEX?
BOOZE? JESUS? RAMBO? or
FROGS?
All are pretty harmless words in
theirproperplace. But Big Brother
at Ontario's ministry of transporta
tion doesn’t think they belong on
the back of your car.
At least, most of them.
After some consideration and a
blizzard of letters from open-mind
ed Franco-Ontarians, the province
decided last year to allow FROG to
appear on licence plates.
The plate censors also allowed
one person’s name on a plate after
discovering it had a scatological
connotation in some Italian dialect.
“It’s the guy’s name. What are
you going to do if it means
something in another language?
Theguycan’thelphis name,” says
one flexible official.
Honest. That’s straight from the
mouth of a woman named Rhonda
Clark, supervisor of the licence
assistance section in the ministry.
She and a dozen or so colleagues
in Downsview and Kingston have
part-time responsibility for re
viewing applications for personal,
vanity or own-choice plates.
They teleconference each week
to sift through a stream of 125 or so
requests for a favourite alpha
numeric expressions that come in
each day.
In four years since Ontario
allowed special requests to be
stamped out by the inmates at
Millbrook Penitentiary, more than
120,000drivers have paid the extra
$100 fee.
During that time the Own Choice
Plate Review Committee has be
come quite sophisticated at weed
ing out naughty, controversial or
potentially offensive requests.
“We haven’t heard many com
plaints (about potentially offend
ing plates slipping through) in the
past couple of years,” says Clark.
Over the years, fewer than 1,900
requests have been rejected.
The no-no words or cryptic
messages are those related to
drugs, alcohol, sex, violence,
death, religion, criminal activities,
vulgar slang, racial slurs and
slander, or those that are deroga
tory to public dignitaries and law
enforcement.
Slang, foreign and general
Englishdictionariesareused in
investigating requests brought
before the committee, comprising
a mix of ages, genders and races.
“We try to put ourselves in the
position of drivers (who will see the
plates),” says Clark. But she says
the committee also tries to empa
thize with applicants who have
their hearts set on special plates.
Sometimes drivers who get
polite letters of rejection have a
reasonable explanation for some
thing the committee thinks can be
wrongly interpreted.
So they are given the opportuni
ty to appeal to a high-level group of
ministry managers who sit on the
Own Choice Plate Appeal Com
mittee.
Being obscure in the hopes of
fooling the committee doesn’t
work, though.
People have been turned down
for all manner of tricky spellings for
four-letter expletives, kinky sex
acts, lewd invitations, unsavory
menusand other words found in
the Bible.
Ontario is not alone in the care it
takes in issuing licence plates.
Even swinging California has a
review committee known affec
tionately as “the dirty dozen”.
There, fees for personal plates
havebeenusedtofund environ
mental projects for 17 years - ever
since Ronald Reagan was the
governor - and 909,597 special
editions have been stamped.
California does, however, show
flexibility in areas that Ontario
does not.
Desirable plates, such as popu
lar first names, can be sold by the
original purchaser. And business
es have sprung up to act as brokers
between sellers and buyers.
In Ontario, however, plates can
only be passed from parent to
child, spouse to spouse, a deceased
person to his or her estate, or
between and within companies.
It also doesn’t work in our
province to apply more than once,
the way a fellow named Lanny did
in California, in the hope that the
original LANNY plate would be
relinquished.
Once a plate registration is
terminated, it’s purged from the
computer system the province uses
to keep track of plates and owners.
California residents have their
added advantage that their state is
so populous plates have been
expanded to seven characters.
When California went to seven
characters, the most sought-after
wording was Porsche (426 re
quests), followed by Ferrari (176)
and GOFORIT (150).
“Idon’tthinkyou’llseethatfor a
long time here,” says Clark.
Order soon if you want
plates for Christmas
For those planning to give
personalized licence plates for
Christmas gifts, it’s best to order
now. According to Ontario Mini
stry of Transportation and Com
munications officials, all plates
ordered by Oct. 21 will be ready for
Christmas.
Since their introduction in July,
1983, personalized plates have
become popular Christmas gifts at
$100 a set. In the past, the number
of orders soared from 60 to
approximately 150 a day by late
October.
However, these plates take six to
eight weeks for delivery, so those
wanting to get ready for the
holidays should order early.
This year, in response to the
Christmas rush, MTC had design
ed money envelopes which can be
placed under the tree in lieu of the
actual plates. The recipients can
then take the money to their local
issuing office and choose what they
want on their plates. The enve
lopes are free and available at all
issuing offices across the province.
Personalized plates may have
from two to six characters arranged
inanycombinationofletters, or
numerals and letters, except those
combinations used on regular
plates. Combinations which do not
include any letters, may contain up
to two numerals.
Seat belts are worth
wearing and caring for
With all the attention being
focused on air bags, seat belts and
passive and impassive restraints,
it’s a wonder we are not tied up in
knots.
Here are some tips on how seat
belts work.
There are several systems used
today, the most common being the
pendulum, centrifugal and latch
systems.
The pendulum system depends
onapendulumto swing in a sudden
impact and lock the seat belt
retractor.
The centrifugal-force type de
pends on the seat belt itself pulling
out of the retractor at such a force
that the mechanism senses the
movement and stops the retractor
wheel.
The third type, probably more
common on European than North
American vehicles, is the belt
latch, which must be pulled out at
slow speed.
In a European car, whether a
Peugeot 505 or any of the other
breeds, you cannot bend forward
quickly, and you certainly won’t
move forward in a crash.
Test the American type of
pulling on the seat be It as you apply
the brakes suddenly, preferably in
a deserted parking lot. If the belt
locks up, that likely indicates that
yourseatbeltwillhelpsaveyou
from injury in the event of a crash.
No matter what system is
installed in your car, periodically
make sure that the belts are in good
condition, not frayed or cut, and
that the mounting bolts are secure.
In areas where highway salt is
applied during snowy weather, it
also is a good idea to make sure that
rust and corrosion have not
penetrated the frame or body near
the seat belt mounting area. (A
crash in an older car with extensive
rust damage could propel the floor,
seat and passenger through the
windshield.)
Make sure the lap belt buckle is
functioning properly. The latch
should engage easily, hold secure
ly and disengage smoothly.
All this is worth checking out
beforehand. In an accident the few
seconds you have to react are not
enough to include checking to see if
your seat belt works.
Although wearing a belt is the
law in every province except
Alberta and Prince Edward Island,
it’sjust common sense towear a
seatbelt at all times, even for a trip
to the grocery store.
1985 DODGE AIRES SE
WAGON-White,aircond., tin
tedglass,4cyl. auto, p.s., p.b.
full chrome wheel covers, 4 dr
Halloween Special $6,995
1984 OLDS DELTA 88
ROYALE BROUGHAM - fully
loaded, luxury car, beige with
brown vinyl roof, wire wheel
covers, 4 dr. Halloween Special $11,995.
>wbus
BARGAIN HAUNT
ON ALL OUR
GOOD USED CARS
1985 GMC HIGH SIERRA
1/2 TON - grey, heavy duty sus
pension, full wheel covers, V-8
auto, p.s., p.b., guage pkg.
below eye mirrors, twin gas
tanks, AM radio, rear step type
bumper.
Halloween Special $10,995.
1984 PONTIAC PARISIENNE
SW WAGON-V-8 auto, 9
senger, air, blue, wire wheel
covers, tinted glass, roof rack
sport mirrors.
Halloween Special $8
1983 COUGAR LS - 2 dr., V-6
auto, p.s., p.b , aircond., p.w.,
tinted glass, salmon brown
with dark brown velour interior
original paint.
Halloween Special $8,295.
1985 CHEVETTE CS - 4 dr.,
auto, grey with red pin stripes
and red interior, 4 cyl.
ECONOMICAL SECOND CAR
PRICEDTOGOAT $5,150.
• Repairs to most
makes and models
HAMMS
CAR SALES
HOURS:
•Gas Pumps
523-4342Mon. to Sat. 8a.m.-6p.m.
Evenings by appointmentBLYTH