By JEFFRY SCOTT
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 11/30/07
For about two months Frank Gumina has driven a 1974 Volkswagen Thing
around with a Georgia tag that reads HA8 JWZ.
Gumina saw nothing in the sequence of letters and the numeral 8 except
a sequence of letters and the numeral eight. Others did.
"I would be at a grocery store or the Wal-Mart and people would say
'Hate Jews?' or 'Jew Hater?' and I had no idea what they were talking
about," Gumina said Friday.
"You know how people just say things that don't make any sense."
Finally, a couple of weeks ago, a mechanic working on Gumina's car
sounded out the letters and the numeral on his tag.
"I got it then," said Gumina. "Hate Jews. I realized I had a problem."
Gumina said he made a few calls and ended up talking with the Atlanta
office of the Anti-Defamation League and the Georgia Department of
Revenue, which handles license plates in the state.
The state has a database of about 8,500 tag number letter sequences
that it blocks from being made into license plates, said Department of
Revenue Spokesman Charles Willey.
The state on Friday said it will now prohibit auto tags that begin
with HA8 or H8 to prevent any accidental or intentional messages of
hate.
Tags on the blocked list included, for instance, "MAFIA," "AZZ
KICKER," and "KKK." The system also blocks any tag that reads as any
combination of words that can be read as curse words or racial slurs,
or anything that starts with the word 'EAT'," said Willey.
Gumina received his tag by happenstance. The sequence was generated by
a computer. It would have been blocked if he had requested it as a
prestige or vanity tag, which is an auto tag with specially requested
letter and number sequences.
"What happened was he ordered it for his car as a hobby or antique
license plate," said Willey. "And hobby tags always begin with HA."
But only one of the 8,468,506 vehicle tags now in circulation in
Georgia would come up with that sequence HA8 JWZ .
Bill Nigut, Southeast Regional Director of the Anti-Defamation League
— which intervened to help Gumina — called the revenue department
decision a "sweet outcome."
But, as of Friday afternoon, Gumina said he still has the tag HA8 JWZ
on his old Volkswagen and he hasn't driven it in two weeks for fear of
continuing to spread a message of hate.
He said he can get a new tag for $7, but the state hasn't assured him
yet they they'll take the old HA8 JWZ off the road for good.
"I'm going to leave my car parked in the driveway until they tell me
they'll give me a new tag and not give the old one to someone else,"
he said, sounding a bit weary with the whole matter.
"I want that tag eliminated."
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