In A Flash

Office of Motor Vehicles locations closed after employee tests positive for COVID-19

By: Jarvis DeBerry - July 6, 2020 4:05 pm

Louisiana Office of Motor Vehicles locations in Alexandria, Lafayette, Monroe and Shreveport were added to a list of previously closed locations Monday after an OMV employee tested positive for COVID-19. Karen St. Germain, commissioner of the Louisiana OMV said in a news release that the employee in question was serving in an administrative role and, thus, had no interactions with the public.

All the state’s OMV locations were closed March 20, and an emergency proclamation from Gov. John Bel Edwards waived licensing and registration requirements through May 20. The four offices that were shut down Monday had been among the 11 offices that started providing limited service May 18 as the state entered phase one of its reopening plan.

After Monday’s announcement, a total of 15 OMV locations statewide are closed indefinitely. They are: Alexandria, Arcadia, Bogalusa, Clinton, Crowley, Dequincy, Harvey, Houma, Jonesboro, Lafayette, Lake Charles, Monroe, Oakdale, Shreveport and Tallulah.

The office is encouraging Louisianians who need OMV services to visit expresslane.org. Residents seeking reinstatements must request them via phone (225-925-6146) by mailing the OMV Mail Center at P.O. Box 64886 / Baton Rouge, La. 70896 or by visiting a Public Tag Agency.

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Jarvis DeBerry

Jarvis DeBerry, former editor of the Louisiana Illuminator, spent 22 years at The Times-Picayune (and later NOLA.com) as a crime and courts reporter, an editorial writer, columnist and deputy opinions editor. He was on the team of Times-Picayune journalists awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service after that team’s coverage of Hurricane Katrina and the deadly flood that followed. In addition to the shared Pulitzer, DeBerry has won awards from the Louisiana Bar Association for best trial coverage and awards from the New Orleans Press Club, the Louisiana/ Mississippi Associated Press and the National Association of Black Journalists for his columns. A collection of his Times-Picayune columns, “I Feel to Believe” was published by the University of New Orleans Press in September 2020.