Vegan wants ILVTOFU on license plate. 2BAD, state says.

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Fearing the vanity plate could be misinterpreted in an offensive manner,

Colorado officials put the request on a list of banned letter combinations. The

ACLU has entered the fray.

By DeeDee Correll

May 10, 2009

Reporting from Denver -- All Kelley Coffman-Lee wanted to do was broadcast her

love of tofu to the driving public.

 

So the Colorado vegan applied to the state's Department of Revenue for a vanity

license plate for her Suzuki SL7 carrying the message: ILVTOFU.

 

 

Clerks at her local motor vehicle office approved the plate -- but it did not

escape the discerning eyes of state revenue officials, who detected another way

that Coffman-Lee's penchant for tofu could be read.

 

" It could be misinterpreted in a way that suggests that she likes something

other than tofu, " explained revenue department spokesman Mark Couch.

 

Application denied.

 

 

Not only that, but Coffman-Lee's pithy ode to soy went straight onto the

department's list of letter combinations banned under a state law that permits

authorities to weed out those applications deemed " offensive to good taste or

decency. "

 

Others that haven't passed muster: OBITEME, 2EROTIC and PASSGAS.

 

The list has grown to 2,744 entries over the years as residents apply for

creative letter combinations to express their personal preferences. " Ever since

we've had vanity plates, there's been someone trying to slip one by us, " Couch

said.

 

Coffman-Lee, who could not be reached for comment, has said that ILVTOFU does

not deserve to be listed. " My whole family is vegan, so tofu is like a staple

for us. I was just going to have a cool license plate, and the DMV

misinterpreted my message, " Coffman-Lee told the Denver Post after the

application was denied.

 

Now the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado has entered the fray,

questioning what it calls censorship by the state.

 

The ACLU has obtained the list of banned phrases. The list reveals " the more

serious ways in which this attempt to purge offensive words has wound up being

an effort to censor ideas and viewpoints, " said Mark Silverstein, legal director

of the Colorado ACLU. He noted that the list includes: BADUSA, 4HEMP and

OK2BGAY.

 

Silverstein noted the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in a 1971 case that a profane

message on a California man's jacket had free speech protections.

 

The courts are divided in their rulings on states' rights to restrict license

plate messages, said Gene Policinski, executive director of the Tennessee-based

First Amendment Center.

 

Some have ruled that governments can regulate such messages as long as the

restrictions aren't based on viewpoints. Others have held that motorists have

the right to express what they wish with little restriction.

 

The next step in Colorado? STYTUND