As Incredible as it seems, a reader disagrees…

I railed on and on about the parking officers who wrote ticket after ticket on a vehicle in New York City and didn’t notice that there was a dead body inside. The post is a few down on the list below. Got some push back from Trish from Gainesville Fl.:

I think you are making some irrational generalizations as there are many facets to look at here. Not all agencies have immediate DMV record availability (Public Works Departments as examples), most agencies use some kind of guideline of when to make the DMV check (ie 3 or more citations as an example) and/or have rules for booting/towing and I think most personnel are sharp! They have no control over illegal tint or rules that are not in their realm so don’t blame them (entirely). I am not familiar with any parking training that does not teach being aware of your surroundings if for no other reason personal safety.

Good points, Trish. However I personally know of a number of cases (OK, they are in New York and LA, not in the heartland, and I consider Florida part of the heartland, except Miami and Orlando, where people do think a bit for themselves) where ticket after ticket was written and the car was just left there.

It seems to me that things should escalate when the second ticket is written. Booting and Towing should be just the beginning. Think of it. Someone has parked their car illegally so long that two officers actually wrote tickets for the car. You know that I believe that 90% of the violations are never written up, so that means that this car attracted a lot of attention. I think that if we towed or booted on the second ticket, we would see a great reduction in parking scofflaws. People break the rules because they think they can get by with it.

Also, I understand that DMV records or stolen car records may not be available, but then why not? Suddenly the police have hundreds of more eyes and ears. Parking officers don’t have to put themselves at risk, just make the call. They all carry radios, don’t they? Let the guys and gals in the bulletproof vests do the rest.

I respectively disagree that they have no control over illegal tint or rules that are not in their realm. I report a car abandoned on my street, or a car with expired registration. I can see no reason why people who are paid by the city to look at cars all day long shouldn’t do more than concern themselves with how it’s parked.

Last week we had a webinar about insurance risk. Kathy Phillips told us that training must be done over and over and over. She said that you can’t train too much. In the Army I learned that you “tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them, and tell then what you told them.”

Somehow I can’t believe that the folks in New York City “got it” when they were told to be aware of their surroundings. Remember, the call came in when the smell got so bad that people in the neighborhood couldn’t handle it any more.

JVH