1. (A) Upon application and payment of the required fee, the Department of Motor Vehicles may issue a standard license plate to a manufacturer for vehicles it has manufactured and which are used in a benefit program for the manufacturer's employees or used by the manufacturer for testing, distribution, evaluation, and promotion.

2. (B) The annual registration fee for this plate is eight hundred eighty dollars.

   1. (1) The plates issued in connection with an employee benefit program may be used only on vehicles provided for the applicant's employees. In the application, the manufacturer shall notify the department in which county the employee assigned the vehicle resides. Twenty dollars and fifty cents of the fee must be credited to the general fund of the State and eight hundred fifty- nine dollars and fifty cents must be remitted to the county noted on the application. Amounts received by a county pursuant to this subsection must be credited to the accounts of taxing entities in the county as if it were a county property tax and are instead of state sales or use taxes. If the employee resides outside this State, the fee must be credited pro rata to all other counties due amounts under this section. The names and addresses of the employees are not required to be submitted to the department, but the department may require the documentation it determines necessary to ensure compliance with the provisions of this section.
   2. (2) The plates issued in connection with testing, distribution, evaluation, and promotion, not to exceed fifty plates, may be used only for those purposes. Twenty dollars and fifty cents of the fee must be credited to the general fund of the State and eight hundred fifty-nine dollars and fifty cents must be remitted to the county in which the principal facility of the manufacturer is located. Amounts received by a county pursuant to this subsection must be credited to the accounts of taxing entities in the county as if it were a county property tax and are instead of state sales or use taxes. The department may require the documentation it determines necessary to ensure compliance with the provisions of this subsection.
3. (C) The annual registration fee provided for in this section is derived by computing the average price of the vehicle manufacturer's fleet times the property tax rate times the state's average millage rate. Before December thirty-first of each odd numbered year, the manufacturer shall review the average price of its fleet and submit the cost to the House Ways and Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee. The annual registration fee must be adjusted to reflect changes in the average cost of the manufacturer's fleet, the state's average millage rate, and the property tax rate. Any adjustment must be reflected in the annual appropriations act.

HISTORY: 1997 Act No. 155, Part II, Section 32C; 2000 Act No. 278, Section 1; 2000 Act No. 387, Part II, Section 20A.

Editor's Note

2010 Act No. 339, Section 1, provides "Notwithstanding the annual fee prescribed pursuant to Section 56-3-2332 of the 1976 Code, for the standard license plate issued to an automobile manufacturer for vehicles used in a benefit program for the manufacturer's employees or for testing, distribution, evaluation, and promotion, the registration fee for applications filed in 2011 and 2012 is six hundred ninety-nine dollars. In accounting for the revenue of this fee for applications filed in 2011 and 2012, twenty dollars is credited to the general fund of the State and the amount required to be remitted to a local government is six hundred seventy-nine dollars. In the case of employees participating in the benefit program who reside outside of this State, the entire fee must be credited to the general fund of the State."

2014 Act No. 321 (S.1000), Section 1, eff January 1, 2015, provides: "SECTION 1. Notwithstanding the annual fee prescribed pursuant to Section 56-3-2332 of the 1976 Code, for the standard license plate issued to an automobile manufacturer for vehicles used in a benefit program for the manufacturer's employees or for testing, distribution, evaluation, and promotion, the registration fee for applications filed in 2015 and 2016 is seven hundred fifty-four dollars. In accounting for the revenue of this fee for applications filed in 2015 and 2016, twenty dollars is credited to the General Fund of the State and the amount required to be remitted to a local government is seven hundred thirty-four dollars. In the case of employees participating in the benefit program who reside outside of this State, the entire fee must be credited to the General Fund of the State."