Get Cash for Your Clunker

Diana Gish/KMXT

The "Cash for Clunkers" program is moving so fast its hard to keep up. "Cash for Clunkers" is the nickname of the government program officially known as the "Car Allowance Rebate System". The acronym spells out the word "CARS" but "Cash for Clunkers"is the popular name for this wildly popular program. KMXT’s Diana Gish has more:

"Cash for Clunkers"is a 1 billion dollar government program that helps consumers buy or lease a more environmentally-friendly car or truck from a participating dealer by trading in a less efficient vehicle. The program is designed to rev up the economy; boost auto sales and put safer, cleaner and more fuel-efficient vehicles on the road. Consumers can receive up to a 4,500 dollar discount from the car dealer when they trade in their old vehicle and purchase or lease a new one.

The program is so popular that in its first week it burned through the billion dollars set aside to pay for it. On Monday the U.S. House voted to keep funding the program which was originally scheduled to run through November. The Senate is expected to approve additional funding later this week. According to www dot cars dot gov (www.cars.gov) "Cash for Clunkers" is still operating. And yes, Alaskans are taking part but it if you want to trade your clunker in for a new vehicle in Kodiak you’ll need to hurry.

Kodiak has only one new car dealership and Debbie Refior (RAY-fee-or) of Kodiak Motors says she’s down to one qualifying car and a few trucks. She said she’s so swamped right now that she doesn’t know how many new Fords she’s sold as part of Cash for Clunkers. She said that meeting all of the federal paperwork and vehicle handling requirements is overwhelming for a small operation. Participating car dealers are required to follow specific instructions for destroying the engines and drive trains of the clunkers before junking them. Refior (RAY-fee-or) also says she hasn’t seen any of the federal funds yet, something she’s not very pleased about it.

When the program started, a computer glitch prevented most Alaskans from taking part, since no Alaska dealers were listed as participants. That’s because no Alaska scrap yards were approved to accept the junked vehicles. Or so it was thought, there actually were some federally certified scrap yards in Alaska when the program began, one of them in Kodiak: Nick’s Auto Wrecking, Salvage and metal recycling. Owner Nick Troxell describes his part of the arrangement.

— (Cash for Clunkers 2:28 "…dollars and buy a new car.")

If you’d like to know if your clunker qualifies for this program you can go to www dot cars dot gov (www.cars.gov) for details.

I’m Diana Gish.

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