Gordon said there’s still a long way to go in reshaping the DMV, but he touted the agency’s progress in reducing waiting times and making it easier to take care of routine tasks, like license renewal, online rather than in person. He said he has visited every one of the state’s 180 DMV offices to watch and to listen, and that he even reads mail from consumers with complaints or suggestions. I caught up with Gordon and Deputy Director Anita Gore a few days ago, and we talked for nearly an hour. Then he chucked Gordon into the gaping jaws of the merciless bureaucratic beast. Gavin Newsom called the agency’s technology “byzantine” and acknowledged that Californians were legitimately “outraged” by soul-sapping DMV encounters. Gordon was a successful Silicon Valley tech executive who didn’t need the job he took in 2019, but after standing in an hours-long DMV line in San Jose, he was encouraged by his wife to be a fixer rather than a complainer.
