Louisiana Office of Motor Vehicles update

Lake Charles, LA (KPLC) - Many associate the OMV with long lines and busy crowds.

But if you drive over to the OMV on main street you don’t find a wait or even staff.

You’ll find yourself with an empty parking lot, and the doors are locked.

“The Lake Charles and Sulphur OMV field offices have been closed since Hurricane Laura of August of 2020,” said public information director for the Louisiana Office of Motor Vehicles Matthew Boudreaux.

The buildings sustained tens of thousands of dollars worth of damage, according to Boudreaux.

“We’re talking about the roofs being ripped off, and once that happens, then all the computers inside the technology in there are ruined,” he said.

A year later, some are wondering if and when they will reopen.

“We’re working very hard with the necessary people to get it reopened as soon as we can,” he said. The Sulphur location is going to be moving to a new location from where it was previously due to the amount of damage sustained from the hurricane.”

While he couldn’t give us a timeline or a reopening date, Boudreaux says they are close.

“We don’t want to open too soon and have to go back and you know, with technology, a lot of things have to happen,” he said. “It’s not just plugging in some computers and saying, let’s open. There’s a lot of different things that go into it even after the structural repairs are complete. So we’re very hopeful in the coming weeks or months to open up Lake Charles.”

For now, he advises customers to go online at expresslane.org.

“There’s about 20 to 25 services there that eligible customers can take advantage of,” he said. “Other than that, you can visit like you mentioned, an express office, all of those are on expresslane.org.

Boudreaux says if you do have to go into an office, the Dequincy location is open.

You can always go to the state’s website to see if an office is closed or by appointment only.

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