Sounds weird? Even though you pay what you owe, you cannot get your license back unless you pay more money. Well it is a weird fee and it is a relatively new one. Indeed, I know of no other state that has an STF or similar fee.
Although termed a “fee”, the STF is actually a tax (but politicians don’t like the T-word). It was concocted a few years ago and was initially only $35. It quickly doubled to $70 effective July, 2009. While $70 per suspension does not appear to be a large number, last year, STFs generated $32,945,771 for New York State, about a 1/3 of all revenue generated by DMV for traffic tickets. Pretty good for a tax, I mean “fee”, which was created out of thin air.