HOUSTON—Tony Jones can see only shadows, so his dog Guerin guides him along.

But the hassle he goes through every year to get a rabies tag has opened Jones’ eyes to a problem.

“It’s arcane. It’s totally, totally, totally out of whack,” Jones said.

First they lost his check, then they couldn’t find his records. All that trouble got him wondering about the process.

“If we have a three year rabies vaccine why can’t we get a three year license?” he said.   

Frustrated, Jones took his story to Houston City Hall where he told the mayor about it. The very next day, Mayor Bill White sent out a memo to all the department heads in the city.

“I am not satisfied with the way our city handles the billing and collection of fees,” Mayor Bill White said in the memo.

And some agree.

“Today I think it’s probably a pain,” Alfred Moran with the Administration and Regulatory Affairs said.

Moran is in charge of fixing the problem, and after four months he thinks he has the solution.

It seems like Houston requires permits for not just dog tags but for many things.  Permits for antique dealers, burglar alarms, valet parking and fruit ripening are only a few.

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For example if someone wanted to use a city park for a wedding they would need a permit first.

Now, by the end of the year, Houston plans to put the entire process for all of this online.

“We call it one-stop permitting. In other words, we’d like to have citizens have as little hassle as possible,” Moran said.

“Something has to give and you know there are people a lot smarter than me, but if I figured it out. They should be able to figure it out,” Jones said.

And maybe the city has finally figured out a solution the problem a blind man helped them see.