This is how we do it…

Louisiana drivers will soon be able to ditch their vehicle inspection stickers, but not everyone is done with inspections.

Starting June 30, drivers cannot get a ticket for not having an inspection sticker. However, vehicles registered in East Baton Rouge, West Baton Rouge, Ascension, Livingston and Iberville parishes are still federally required to get annual emissions inspections.

That means most Louisiana drivers will no longer need to visit an inspection station for the traditional safety sticker, but drivers in those five parishes will still need to make sure their vehicle passes emissions testing.

Those parishes are part of the Baton Rouge ozone nonattainment area, which has been subject to vehicle emissions testing requirements under the federal Clean Air Act.

Instead of a sticker certifying the inspection, drivers will receive a QR code tied to their vehicle registration.

What drivers should know

For most Louisiana drivers, the end of inspection stickers means they will no longer need to visit an inspection station for the traditional safety sticker.

For drivers in the Baton Rouge-area emissions parishes, annual emissions testing will still be required. Certified Motor Vehicle Inspection stations in the region will still be able to offer those inspections, but some locations may stop providing the service.

In Baton Rouge, most people would go to Benny’s Car Wash to get an inspection sticker. Benny’s stopped offering that service. Now, the State Police say there are still 182 places in the “nonattainment area” around Baton Rouge which issue inspection sticker. Come July, that number probably falls off to almost none, because if you can’t get a ticket for not having an inspection sticker then what’s the point of going through the hassle and then paying for it?

Nobody is going to bother.

Oh, yes, the feds require that people in the Baton Rouge area get their vehicles inspected. And, what? The EPA is going to send men with guns to arrest motorists who don’t have proof of an inspection?

Good luck with that. Maybe if AOC gets elected president in 2028 something like that will happen. We doubt it.

It’s not the best way to operate, you know – openly flouting laws on the books. On the other hand those laws are stupid.

Louisiana doesn’t have a lot of places where this would be an issue, but we wouldn’t be completely surprised if there is a smattering of leftist Karens  who begin harassing people who don’t have inspection stickers on their cars on account of the damage they’re doing to the ozone layer.

That’s an insane argument, of course. Just because you don’t have a sticker, it doesn’t follow that your vehicle is polluting the air and destroying the ozone layer. Pretty much every vehicle made in the past 25 years is going to be compliant with these environmental standards.

But a sanity standard isn’t particularly applicable to some of the folks who, for example, stand in front of Pennington Biomedical Center on Perkins Road holding stupid signs and demanding Jeff Landry be recalled. We wouldn’t put a whole lot past those people, not that there are many of them.

Texas got rid of their inspection sticker years ago. We had a hell of a time finally getting rid of ours. But instead of truly getting rid of it and replacing it with this QR code which could be a net convenience – rather than asking you for your registration and proof of insurance, the cop pulling you over can just scan the QR code and get that information – we think it’s hilarious that we’ll just stop giving tickets for not having a sticker.

Let everybody break the law and thereby have no law.

That’s Louisiana. We’re used to it. It’ll be fine. And yes, losing the stupid inspection sticker is a win.