Expiration of licenses

(a) Except as provided in subsection (c) of this section, every driver's license expires eight years from the date of its issuance. (b)(1) Every driver's license issued to a person who has attained his or her twenty-first birthday expires on the licensee's birthday. The commissioner may modify the expiration date of any license as necessary to effectuate the transition from the five-year renewal cycle to an eight-year renewal cycle as he or she considers necessary. (2) Every driver's license issued to a person who has not attained his or her twenty-first birthday expires thirty days after the licensee's twenty-first birthday, except as provided in section three-a of this article. (3) The driver's license of any person in the armed forces expires six months after the date on which the person is separated from active duty in the armed forces under honorable circumstances. (c) A license issued to a person who is not a citizen of the United States may only be issued for the time the person is legally authorized to be in the United States, not to exceed eight years. If the time the person is authorized to be in the United States is extended, the commissioner may renew the license in accordance with section twelve-a of this article for the time extended, not to exceed eight years.