vehicles 0.4.1 → 0.8.0

data/data/plates/us-vi.yml

@@ -0,0 +1,489 @@
+# plates/us-vi.yml — United States Virgin Islands (PRD-PLATES gate L2, territories).
+#
+# THE SOURCING SITUATION HERE IS THE INVERSE OF GUAM'S, AND IT IS STATED UP
+# FRONT BECAUSE IT SHAPES EVERY ENTRY BELOW. Guam's statute is fully reachable
+# and its agency is not; the Virgin Islands' agency is fully reachable and its
+# statute is not. Title 20 of the Virgin Islands Code (Motor Vehicles) could NOT
+# be obtained in this pass by any route attempted — law.justia.com returns HTTP
+# 403 to both curl and WebFetch, lexisnexis.com/hottopics/vicode/ and
+# advance.lexis.com serve JavaScript shells with no extractable text,
+# vicode.lexisnexis.com does not resolve, legvi.org returns 403, law.onecle.com
+# and law.resource.org have no VI tree, and the Wayback Machine holds NO
+# snapshot of the Justia VI Title 20 pages (the availability API returns an
+# empty archived_snapshots object). Those are recorded as measured dead ends.
+#
+# WHAT WE HAVE INSTEAD IS BETTER THAN USUAL FOR A DESIGN QUESTION: the VI Bureau
+# of Motor Vehicles publishes its own plate announcements, and its March 2023
+# notice gives a HARD EFFECTIVE DATE for the current base from the issuing
+# agency itself. That is a primary source of exactly the kind PRD-PLATES §4
+# ranks second only to statute — and it is why the USVI is the only jurisdiction
+# in the territories group whose current AND previous standard bases are both
+# minted as dated series.
+#
+# WHAT IS DELIBERATELY NOT HERE (PRD-PLATES §2.5): individual specialty DESIGNS.
+jurisdiction: us-vi
+authority:
+  name: United States Virgin Islands Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV)
+  url: "https://bmv.vi.gov/"
+binding: vehicle
+statute_edition: >-
+  NOT OBTAINED. Title 20 of the Virgin Islands Code governs motor vehicles and
+  is cited by BMV itself — see § 335 (notice of transfer, 24-hour duty) and
+  § 218a (Certificate of Title fee exemption for seniors and disabled persons),
+  both quoted on BMV's Vehicles page. Neither section's text, nor any
+  plate-format, plate-design or plate-display section, was reachable. Every
+  statutory reference in this file is therefore SECOND-HAND THROUGH BMV and is
+  marked as such.
+
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+# artwork_risk — required per jurisdiction by PRD-PLATES §4 / §7.1.
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+artwork_risk:
+  posture: unresearched-presumed-protected
+  basis: >-
+    Two things are established and they point the same way. First, US federal
+    copyright law APPLIES IN THE VIRGIN ISLANDS: the US Copyright Office states
+    that "US federal copyright law applies in the US Virgin Islands, Guam, and
+    the Northern Mariana Islands but not in American Samoa". Second, NO Commons
+    public-domain tag exists for the government of the Virgin Islands —
+    Template:PD-USVIGov returns 404 — and {{PD-USGov-Unincorporated}} is
+    expressly limited to UNORGANIZED territories, which the USVI is not. There is
+    no analogue here to Florida's Microdecisions v. Skinner or to Puerto Rico's
+    {{PD-PRGov}}.
+  conclusion: >-
+    Treat USVI plate ARTWORK as presumptively protected. The exposure is
+    concrete and unusually sharp: the current base is a COMMEMORATIVE design
+    built around a "175th Emancipation" logo, and a commemorative logo is far
+    closer to a discrete authored work than a state map or a generic floral
+    motif is. Do not approximate it, do not trace it, and do not render it.
+  edicts: >-
+    Edicts of government remain public domain at every level
+    ({{PD-US-GovEdict}}), so Title 20 VIC would be freely usable — if it could be
+    obtained. It could not. That is the central irony of this file and the reason
+    its evidence grades are lower than Guam's or Puerto Rico's despite the USVI
+    having the single best-dated series in the group.
+  emblem_rule: >-
+    PRD-PLATES §3's placeholder default applies without exception to the 175TH
+    EMANCIPATION LOGO and to the Virgin Islands coat of arms. Render
+    `emblem: {present: true, rendered: placeholder}` and do not revisit until a
+    USVI government-works copyright posture is affirmatively established.
+  photograph_caution: >-
+    plateshack.com carries no extractable licence and is treated as all rights
+    reserved. No image was copied; its pages were used only to corroborate which
+    series exist and to date them.
+  sources:
+    - "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Copyright_rules_by_territory/United_States  # the US Copyright Office position that federal copyright law applies in the US Virgin Islands; the US Territories tag list, which contains no Virgin Islands entry; and the UNORGANIZED-territories limit on {{PD-USGov-Unincorporated}}"
+    - "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template:PD-USVIGov  # HTTP 404 — a measured negative: no Commons public-domain tag exists for the government of the US Virgin Islands"
+    - "https://bmv.vi.gov/2023/03/03/2023-emancipation-license-plates/  # the current base is expressly a COMMEMORATIVE design, which is what sharpens the artwork risk"
+
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+# The US standards chain. NOTHING here quotes SAE J686 (paywalled, unpinned).
+# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+us_standards:
+  no_federal_mandate: true
+  usvi_position: "No evidence was found that the USVI has adopted the AAMVA standard, and no VI instrument was reachable in which such an adoption could be recorded. AAMVA geometry is recorded as context only."
+  aamva_edition_3:
+    dimensions_delegated: "AAMVA §3.1 delegates dimensions and bolt holes to SAE J686, whose text is PAYWALLED and was NOT obtained. No J686 dimension is quoted here."
+    character_layout: "AAMVA §2.2: characters at least 2.5 in high, spaced at least 0.25 in apart, stroke weight 0.2-0.4 in, at least 1.25 in clear of top and bottom edges"
+    replacement_cycle: >-
+      AAMVA §1.1 recommends a rolling or full replacement cycle not to exceed
+      7-10 years. THE USVI IS THE ONE TERRITORY IN THIS GROUP THAT DEMONSTRABLY
+      RAN A FULL REPLACEMENT: BMV's March 2023 notice makes the new plate
+      MANDATORY, requires the old plates to be surrendered before a registration
+      renewal can complete, and states the renewal "will not be completed until
+      the old plates have been turned in". That is a full-fleet replacement
+      executed through the renewal cycle, and it is documented by the issuing
+      agency rather than inferred.
+    source: "https://www.aamva.org/getmedia/646bcc8a-219b-47d8-b5cd-726240473163/License-Plate-Standard-Edition-3_September-2025-Update.pdf"
+
+display_rules:
+  default: >-
+    UNRESOLVED — RECORDED AS A GAP RATHER THAN GUESSED. The front/rear rule for
+    the Virgin Islands lives in Title 20 VIC, which was not obtainable, and BMV's
+    public pages do not state it. The US/world dossier's front-plate survey is a
+    Wikipedia aggregate and is a locator, not an authority. NO front/rear claim
+    is made for this jurisdiction.
+  surrender_on_transfer: >-
+    Second-hand through BMV, which paraphrases Title 20 § 335: the transferor
+    must notify BMV of a transfer within 24 hours on BMV forms; on receipt BMV
+    marks the transferor's registration licence "cancelled" and VOIDS the
+    corresponding LICENSE PLATES; the cancellation and voiding take effect 48
+    hours after the Director receives the notice; the vehicle may be operated
+    during that 48-hour window but afterwards only if the transferee has applied
+    for and received a new registration licence AND new plates.
+  cancellation: "BMV: to cancel a registration, 'the plates and sticker must be removed from the vehicle and returned to the BMV' with a signed cancellation application — so the USVI, like Puerto Rico, treats the plate as returnable state property, and validates on a separate STICKER"
+  inspection_cycle: >-
+    BMV: all vehicles require annual inspection EXCEPT private vehicles that are
+    six, eight and ten years old; private vehicles that are seven, nine and older
+    must be inspected. An alternating-year exemption keyed to even ages is an
+    oddity worth recording, and it is quoted from BMV verbatim in substance.
+  sources:
+    - "https://bmv.vi.gov/vehicles/  # BMV's own statement of the Title 20 § 335 transfer/voiding rule, the plate-and-sticker return requirement on cancellation, the annual inspection rule and its age exemptions, the dealer-only third-party/double transfer rule, and the § 218a senior/disabled title-fee exemption"
+
+series:
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # THE STANDARD-ISSUE SERIES — and the ISLAND PREFIX, which is the best
+  # region-encoding fact in the territories group after Guam's office table.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: us-vi-standard-2023
+    class: standard
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus]
+    period: { start: 2023 }
+    period_evidence: agency-instrument-date
+    matching: strict
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLL 999"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z]{3} ?\d{3}\z'
+      regex_strict: '\A[CTJ][A-Z]{2} ?\d{3}\z'
+      charset:
+        notes: >-
+          The first letter is not free: it is the ISLAND CODE (see
+          region_encoding), which is why `regex_strict` exists and pins it to
+          [CTJ]. The remaining two letters and three numerals have no sourced
+          restriction — no VI instrument stating letter exclusions (the I/O/Q
+          exclusions common in US states) was obtainable, so none is claimed.
+      pattern_note: >-
+        `regex` is the round-trippable printed form and carries no charset
+        restriction, per PRD-PLATES §2.7. `regex_strict` adds the one restriction
+        that IS attested — the island prefix — and is contained in `regex` by
+        construction. There is no `regex_statutory` because Title 20 VIC could not
+        be obtained and therefore no outer legal bound is known.
+    design:
+      plate: { w: 12, h: 6, unit: in, w_mm: 304.8, h_mm: 152.4 }
+      plate_dimension_note: "12 x 6 in aluminium is locator-reported; no VI instrument fixing it was obtainable"
+      background: { finish: retroreflective }
+      colour_note: >-
+        NO HEX IS RECORDED. The reported design is a three-band composition —
+        teal top stripe, white middle stripe, gold bottom stripe, with black
+        embossed serials and the 175th Emancipation logo centred. "Teal" and
+        "gold" are colour NAMES from a locator, not values from a spec, and
+        inventing hexes for them would be exactly the laundering PRD-PLATES §9
+        warns about. Recorded as descriptions; hexes await a BMV or Title 20
+        source.
+      legend_top: "U.S. VIRGIN ISLANDS"
+      legend_slogan_reported: "175th Emancipation"
+      graphic: { present: true, rendered: placeholder, description: "175th Emancipation commemorative logo, centred — locator-grade description; the design is COMMEMORATIVE and carries the highest artwork risk in this group" }
+      emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder }
+      band: { side: none }
+      rear_differs: false
+    validation: "a separate WINDSHIELD STICKER, not a plate decal — BMV requires 'the plates and sticker' to be surrendered together on cancellation, and dated VI windshield stickers are independently photographed"
+    mandatory_replacement:
+      effective: "2023-03-01"
+      rule: >-
+        BMV, in its own words: "Effective March 1, 2023, all vehicles with
+        TEMPORARY plates that were issued by the BMV will be exchanged at no cost
+        for the new MANDATORY VI 175th Emancipation Commemorative Plates, an
+        appointment is required. All other vehicles will only be issued the new
+        Emancipation Plates during their annual registration renewal process. In
+        order to renew the registration, the old plates must be removed and
+        returned to the BMV. The vehicle registration renewal process will not be
+        completed until the old plates have been turned in."
+      concessions: "free for registrants aged 65 and over; personalised BMV plates charged at $49; plates are collected in person and are NOT mailed even where the renewal is completed online"
+    region_encoding:
+      scheme: island-prefix
+      note: >-
+        The FIRST LETTER of the serial encodes the island of registration. This
+        is the USVI's signature plate fact and the reason its serials are
+        three-letter rather than two: the prefix is meaning, not padding.
+      table:
+        C: "Saint Croix"
+        T: "Saint Thomas (and Saint John before 1975)"
+        J: "Saint John (introduced 1975, when it was split out of the T block)"
+      evidence: >-
+        LOCATOR-GRADE, AND SAID SO. The C/T/J assignment comes from a Wikipedia
+        locator's per-era serial table and is corroborated only indirectly, by
+        photographs captioned as St. Thomas and St. Croix taxi plates. No VI
+        instrument was obtainable. It is recorded as a decode because it is
+        internally consistent across seven decades of reported serials — C-123 and
+        T-123 from 1939, J-123 appearing exactly at the reported 1975 split — but
+        it must be verified against Title 20 before any parse API decodes an
+        island from it.
+    sources:
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/2023/03/03/2023-emancipation-license-plates/  # THE PRIMARY DATE SOURCE: BMV's own notice — effective March 1 2023, the plates are MANDATORY, temporary-plate holders exchange at no cost by appointment, all other vehicles receive them at annual renewal, old plates must be surrendered before renewal completes, free at 65 and over, $49 for personalised, collected in person"
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/fees/  # BMV's published fee schedule — Personalized Plates $49.00, Registration Cancellation $12.00, Moving Permit $20.00, Certificates of Title $54.00 (free for seniors)"
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/vehicles/  # the plate-and-sticker surrender rule on cancellation, and the Title 20 § 335 transfer/voiding rule quoted second-hand"
+      - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_the_United_States_Virgin_Islands  # LOCATOR ONLY (PRD-PLATES §4): the CAB 123 / TAB 123 / JAB 123 arrangement, the C/T/J island prefixes and the 1975 introduction of J, the teal/white/gold banded design with the 175th Emancipation logo, and 12x6 in aluminium construction"
+      - "http://www.plateshack.com/y2k/Virgin_Islands/viy2k.html  # CORROBORATION (PRD-PLATES §4): a photograph captioned 'New Virgin Islands standard license plate issued in 2023 - 175th Anniversary of Emancipation', which independently confirms BMV's date and design name. No licence statement on the site; no image or text copied"
+    notes: >-
+      USVI STANDARD ISSUE, CURRENT BASE — AND THE BEST-DATED SERIES IN THE
+      TERRITORIES GROUP. `period_evidence: agency-instrument-date` is a real
+      claim: the issuing agency published the effective date, the mandatory
+      status, and the mechanism of changeover, and an independent photograph
+      confirms it. Compare Guam and the Northern Marianas in this same group,
+      where every base boundary is secondary. THE TRANSITION IS MODELLED HONESTLY
+      AS AN OVERLAP: because the new plates were issued at each vehicle's annual
+      renewal rather than in a single swap, the 2016 base remained lawfully on the
+      road throughout 2023 and beyond. That is precisely the parallel-issuance
+      case PRD-PLATES §2.2 sanctions, and the two series overlap deliberately.
+
+  - id: us-vi-standard-2016
+    class: standard
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus]
+    period: { start: 2016, end: 2023 }
+    period_evidence: mixed-locator-start-agency-end
+    matching: strict
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLL 999"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z]{3} ?\d{3}\z'
+      regex_strict: '\A[CTJ][A-Z]{2} ?\d{3}\z'
+      charset: { notes: "same island-prefixed grammar as the current base; the serial arrangement did NOT change at the 2023 boundary, only the artwork did" }
+    design:
+      plate: { w: 12, h: 6, unit: in }
+      background: { finish: retroreflective }
+      emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder }
+      note: "the preceding base's artwork is L4 scope and its evidence is photographic, not instrumental; it is not described here"
+    region_encoding:
+      scheme: island-prefix
+      note: "identical C/T/J scheme — see us-vi-standard-2023's table; the prefix long predates both bases"
+      evidence: locator-grade
+    sources:
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/2023/03/03/2023-emancipation-license-plates/  # THE END BOUNDARY IS PRIMARY: BMV's notice makes the successor plate mandatory from March 1 2023 and requires surrender of 'the old plates' at renewal, which is what closes this series"
+      - "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_the_United_States_Virgin_Islands  # LOCATOR ONLY: the April 2016 start of this base and its February 2023 end. The START is locator-grade and is NOT corroborated by any agency source"
+      - "http://www.plateshack.com/y2k/Virgin_Islands/viy2k.html  # CORROBORATION: dated photographs of VI plates in use in 2017, 2018 and September 2019, which place a distinct base in circulation across this window without fixing either boundary"
+    notes: >-
+      THE PREVIOUS USVI STANDARD BASE — the "one series back" PRD-PLATES §7 asks
+      for at L2. ITS TWO BOUNDARIES HAVE DIFFERENT EVIDENCE GRADES AND THE FIELD
+      SAYS SO: `period_evidence: mixed-locator-start-agency-end`. The END is
+      anchored by BMV's own mandatory-replacement notice and is a real claim; the
+      START is a Wikipedia locator's April 2016 and is not corroborated anywhere.
+      A verifier should attack the 2016 figure first. NOTE ALSO that the serial
+      grammar is UNCHANGED across the boundary — same island prefix, same
+      three-plus-three shape — so unlike Guam's 1994/2009 boundary this one cannot
+      be detected from the serial at all. Only the artwork changed, which means a
+      parse API can never date a USVI plate from its number.
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # CORE DISTINCT CLASSES. The USVI demonstrably serialises these separately —
+  # BMV publishes a distinct application form for several of them — but NO
+  # format is sourced for any, because Title 20 was unobtainable. Every one is
+  # therefore `matching: recall-only` with the shape catch-all.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: us-vi-dealer
+    class: dealer
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: agency-instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLL 999"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9])*\z'
+      charset: { notes: "no grammar sourced; Title 20 VIC unobtainable" }
+      pattern_note: "ILLUSTRATIVE PATTERN, CATCH-ALL REGEX. A match is a shape hit and nothing more — that is what `matching: recall-only` declares."
+    design: { plate: { note: "not sourced" }, emblem: { present: false } }
+    binding: business
+    eligibility: >-
+      BMV maintains a "Dealer License Plate Application Form", and separately
+      restricts THIRD-PARTY AND DOUBLE TRANSFERS to dealers holding a Power of
+      Attorney signed by the seller — so a VI dealer is a distinct regulated actor
+      with its own plate application route.
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/forms/  # BMV's published forms index, which lists a 'Dealer License Plate Application Form' under Vehicle Registration & Titling — direct agency evidence that a distinct dealer plate series exists"
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/vehicles/  # the dealer-only third-party and double-transfer rule and its Power of Attorney requirement"
+    notes: >-
+      USVI DEALER PLATES. Minted on the strength of the issuing agency publishing
+      a dedicated application form for them — which establishes the SERIES EXISTS
+      without establishing anything about its grammar. `period: {start: 2026}` is
+      the year BMV's forms index was read and is an UPPER BOUND on the true start,
+      recorded in the Florida manner rather than invented. This entry is a
+      placeholder with citations, and it is honest about being one.
+
+  - id: us-vi-temporary
+    class: temporary
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: agency-instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLL 999"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9])*\z'
+      charset: { notes: "no grammar sourced" }
+      pattern_note: "illustrative pattern, catch-all regex — see us-vi-dealer's note"
+    design: { plate: { note: "not sourced" }, emblem: { present: false } }
+    variants_evidenced:
+      - "DEALER TEMPORARY TAGS — BMV publishes both a 'Dealer Temporary Tag Application Form' and a 'Dealer Temporary Tag Issuance Form', the two-form structure implying dealer authorisation followed by per-tag issuance, the same shape as Guam's 16 GCA § 7179"
+      - "BMV-ISSUED TEMPORARY PLATES — the March 2023 notice refers to 'all vehicles with TEMPORARY plates that were issued by the BMV', confirming BMV issues temporaries directly and separately from the dealer channel"
+      - "MOVING PERMIT — BMV requires a first-time registrant to obtain a moving permit before presenting the vehicle for inspection; the fee is $20.00"
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/forms/  # the 'Dealer Temporary Tag Application Form' and 'Dealer Temporary Tag Issuance Form'"
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/2023/03/03/2023-emancipation-license-plates/  # BMV's reference to vehicles carrying TEMPORARY plates 'that were issued by the BMV' — evidence of a BMV-issued temporary channel distinct from the dealer one"
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/vehicles/  # the moving-permit requirement for first-time registration; https://bmv.vi.gov/fees/ prices it at $20.00"
+    notes: >-
+      USVI TEMPORARY PLATES — and there are demonstrably at least TWO channels,
+      dealer-issued and BMV-issued, plus a separate moving permit for the
+      pre-inspection stage. They are not split into separate series because
+      nothing distinguishes them in the evidence except the issuer, and minting
+      three format-identical placeholders would be modelling noise. The
+      two-channel structure is recorded in `variants_evidenced` so a later pass
+      knows exactly what to split.
+
+  - id: us-vi-motorcycle
+    class: motorcycle
+    categories: [motorcycle]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: photographic-in-use-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLL 999"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9])*\z'
+      charset: { notes: "no grammar sourced; the plate is reduced-size, which is why it is a separate series at all" }
+      pattern_note: "illustrative pattern, catch-all regex — see us-vi-dealer's note"
+    design: { plate: { note: "reduced size; no dimension sourced" }, emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder } }
+    region_encoding: { scheme: island-prefix, note: "presumed to share the C/T/J prefix; NOT verified for this class", evidence: unverified }
+    sources:
+      - "http://www.plateshack.com/y2k/Virgin_Islands/viy2k.html  # CORROBORATION ONLY (PRD-PLATES §4): photographs of US Virgin Islands MOTORCYCLE plates with 2014 and 2017 expirations, establishing that a separately-issued motorcycle plate exists. No format, colour or dimension is claimed from a photograph"
+    notes: >-
+      USVI MOTORCYCLE PLATES. THE WEAKEST-EVIDENCED SERIES IN THIS FILE, and
+      flagged accordingly: its entire basis is two dated photographs on an
+      enthusiast site with no licence statement. It is minted rather than dropped
+      for one reason — PRD-PLATES §7's L2 scope names motorcycle as a core class
+      to spec where the jurisdiction separately serialises it, and a series with
+      citations and an explicit `recall-only` matcher is more useful to a consumer
+      than silence. `period: {start: 2026}` is a read-date upper bound and carries
+      no historical claim whatsoever.
+
+  - id: us-vi-taxi
+    class: taxi
+    categories: [car, van, bus]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: photographic-in-use-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLL 999"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9])*\z'
+      charset: { notes: "no grammar sourced" }
+      pattern_note: "illustrative pattern, catch-all regex — see us-vi-dealer's note"
+    design: { plate: { note: "not sourced" }, emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder } }
+    quota: "BMV publishes an 'Application for Rental Vehicles Quota' form, evidence that the USVI operates numeric quotas on at least one for-hire fleet class"
+    region_encoding: { scheme: island-prefix, note: "photographs are captioned as St. Thomas and St. Croix taxi plates, consistent with the island prefix applying to this class too", evidence: weak-corroboration }
+    sources:
+      - "http://www.plateshack.com/y2k/Virgin_Islands/viy2k.html  # CORROBORATION ONLY: photographs of a '2010 issued U.S. Virgin Islands taxi plate used on St. Thomas' and a 'U.S. Virgin Islands, St. Croix taxi plate', establishing a separately-issued taxi series and its island association"
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/forms/  # the 'Application for Rental Vehicles Quota' form — agency evidence of quota administration over for-hire fleets"
+    notes: >-
+      USVI TAXI PLATES. Kept separate from the standard series because the
+      photographs show a distinct plate type and because the Virgin Islands'
+      economy makes for-hire vehicles a large and separately administered fleet.
+      EVIDENCE IS PHOTOGRAPHIC ONLY. The rental-quota form is included because it
+      is the one piece of AGENCY evidence that the USVI administers for-hire
+      classes numerically, which is the administrative fingerprint of a separate
+      serial namespace.
+
+  - id: us-vi-government
+    class: government
+    categories: [car, van, truck, bus]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: photographic-in-use-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLL 999"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9])*\z'
+      charset: { notes: "no grammar sourced" }
+      pattern_note: "illustrative pattern, catch-all regex — see us-vi-dealer's note"
+    design: { plate: { note: "not sourced" }, emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder } }
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "http://www.plateshack.com/y2k/Virgin_Islands/viy2k.html  # CORROBORATION ONLY: photographs of a 'Virgin Islands Police Department Official plate' (ca. 2017) and a 'Virgin Islands Tax Assessor plate', establishing that VI government fleets carry OFFICIAL plates distinct from standard issue"
+    notes: >-
+      USVI GOVERNMENT PLATES. Recorded as one series rather than split into
+      government and police, even though the photographic evidence shows a POLICE
+      DEPARTMENT plate specifically, because nothing in the evidence establishes
+      whether police run their own namespace or sit inside a general official
+      series — and _meta/classes.yml defines `police` as police fleets WHERE
+      DISTINCT from government, a condition that cannot be tested here. Splitting
+      on a photograph would be inventing a distinction.
+
+  - id: us-vi-personalized
+    class: personalized
+    categories: [car, van, truck, motorcycle]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: agency-instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLLLLL"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9])*\z'
+      charset:
+        notes: >-
+          NO LENGTH CAP AND NO ALPHABET RESTRICTION IS SOURCED. Title 20 VIC could
+          not be obtained, and BMV publishes a "Personalized License Plate" form
+          without stating the rules on its public pages. Contrast Guam, whose
+          seven-position cap is in statute, and Florida, whose is. The USVI's is
+          simply unknown, and an unbounded catch-all with `matching: recall-only`
+          is the only honest encoding of that.
+      pattern_note: "illustrative pattern; the regex claims nothing"
+    design: { plate: { note: "not sourced" }, emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder } }
+    fee: "$49.00, per BMV's published fee schedule and confirmed independently in BMV's March 2023 plate notice ('Personalized BMV plates will be charged $49')"
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/fees/  # 'Personalized Plates $49.00' in BMV's own published schedule"
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/forms/  # BMV's 'Personalized License Plate' application form"
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/2023/03/03/2023-emancipation-license-plates/  # independent confirmation of the $49 figure, and the distinction BMV draws between PERSONALIZED BMV plates and VANITY plates 'charged by the organization issuing the plates'"
+    notes: >-
+      USVI PERSONALISED PLATES. THE VALUABLE FACT HERE IS A DISTINCTION, NOT A
+      FORMAT: BMV's March 2023 notice separates "Personalized BMV plates", priced
+      by BMV at $49, from "Vanity plates", which "will continue to be charged BY
+      THE ORGANIZATION ISSUING THE PLATES". That is direct agency evidence that
+      the USVI runs an organisation-sponsored plate channel alongside its own
+      personalised channel — see us-vi-specialty-index — and it is the kind of
+      structural fact that a fee schedule alone would never surface.
+
+  # =========================================================================
+  # SPECIALTY — INDEX ONLY, per PRD-PLATES §2.5.
+  # =========================================================================
+  - id: us-vi-specialty-index
+    class: specialty
+    categories: [car, van, truck, motorcycle]
+    period: { start: 2026 }
+    period_evidence: agency-instrument-in-force-upper-bound
+    matching: recall-only
+    format:
+      pattern: "LLL 999"
+      regex: '\A[A-Z0-9](?: ?[A-Z0-9])*\z'
+      charset: { notes: "specialty plates are presumed to carry ordinary island-prefixed serials on alternative designs; not verified" }
+      pattern_note: "illustrative only — this is an INDEX entry, not a spec"
+    design:
+      plate: { note: "one design per programme; the designs themselves are L4 scope (PRD-PLATES §2.5) and none is described here" }
+      emblem: { present: true, rendered: placeholder }
+    program_index:
+      count_official: null
+      count_official_note: >-
+        NO COUNT IS PUBLISHED AND NONE IS INVENTED. BMV maintains no specialty
+        gallery, no programme list and no enumerated catalogue on its public site;
+        the only structural fact it publishes is that vanity plates are "charged by
+        the ORGANIZATION issuing the plates", which establishes the channel exists
+        without sizing it. This is the single largest gap in the USVI file and the
+        most valuable thing a follow-up pass could close.
+      channel_structure: >-
+        BMV DRAWS A TWO-CHANNEL DISTINCTION IN ITS OWN WORDS: "Personalized BMV
+        plates will be charged $49 and VANITY PLATES will continue to be charged
+        BY THE ORGANIZATION ISSUING THE PLATES." So in the USVI a sponsoring
+        organisation, not the Bureau, prices its own plate — an administrative
+        arrangement closer to Texas's vendored MyPlates model than to Florida's
+        statutory annual-use-fee model, and worth flagging for the encyclopedia.
+      programs_evidenced:
+        - "Humane Society of St. Thomas (type first issued 2006)"
+        - "Prince Hall Masons (2006)"
+        - "US Virgin Islands Olympics (2009-2010) and Paralympics (2002)"
+        - "Virgin Islands Vintage & Classic Car Club (in use 2018)"
+        - "Alpha Kappa Alpha (in use 2017)"
+      programs_evidenced_note: >-
+        PHOTOGRAPHIC EVIDENCE ONLY, from a single enthusiast site, and listed to
+        show the SHAPE of the programme — fraternal, sporting, animal-welfare and
+        car-club sponsors — not to assert a catalogue. Five attested programmes is
+        a floor, not a count.
+    region_encoding: none
+    sources:
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/2023/03/03/2023-emancipation-license-plates/  # BMV's own two-channel statement: personalised BMV plates at $49 versus vanity plates priced by the sponsoring organisation"
+      - "https://bmv.vi.gov/fees/  # the published fee schedule, which contains NO specialty or vanity line item — corroborating that those are priced outside BMV"
+      - "http://www.plateshack.com/y2k/Virgin_Islands/viy2k.html  # CORROBORATION + GAP-FINDER: dated photographs of the five sponsored programmes listed above. No image or text copied; used only to establish that the channel is populated"
+    notes: >-
+      THE SPECIALTY PROGRAM INDEX — one entry standing for the whole programme,
+      per PRD-PLATES §2.5. THE HONEST HEADLINE IS THAT THIS INDEX HAS NO COUNT.
+      Florida's index records a contested count from two sources; Guam's and Puerto
+      Rico's record exact statutory counts; the USVI's records that the issuing
+      agency publishes nothing at all and that the pricing sits with third-party
+      sponsors. Recording the absence, with the reason and the five photographed
+      programmes that prove the channel is live, is more useful than a number
+      invented from a photo gallery — and it tells a verifier precisely where to
+      dig.