Nearly one million of the 12.7 million Pennsylvanians are military veterans and many of those have been decorated for valor or meritorious service.
In time for Veterans' Day, The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) has unveiled seven new license plates that are available to decorated military personnel, active and retired. "These are our heroes," said PennDOT spokeswoman Jan McKnight.
PennDOT already offers a variety of military license plates for former POW's, World War II, Vietnam War, Persian Gulf War and Operation Iraqi Freedom vets. But now the agency is making available license plates for recipients of the Distinguished Service Cross, Distringuished Flying Cross, Navy Cross, Air Force Cross, Silver Star, Bronze Star for Valor and Bronze Star. McKnight admits that PennDOT doesn't expect to make a lot of these plates but not because of a lack of medal winners.
"It's been our experience that these heroes don't brag about themselves," said McKnight. "However PennDOT is happy and proud to make these options available to them. They're distinguished veterans that have done us a tremendous service and at least the opportunity is there should they decide to use it."
However, there is still a fee involved like any of the specialty license plates PennDOT offers. For these seven new military awards license plates, the fee ranges from $7.50 to $20.
"I believe it's just a matter of a processing fee, again PennDOT's not in it to make money and we don't. This is not a money-making venture."
