First, Los Angeles tells the homeless they can work off their parking fines if they don’t have the money to pay them. Now California leaders are talking about a bill that creates a payment plan for frequent illegal parking offenders.
According to laweekly.com, the bill would allow drivers who have received tickets and been denied vehicle registration for failing to pay the fines for those tickets an option for payment. Kind of like a parking ticket layaway plan.
Besides the installment option, lower income offenders could be given a reduced fine. All offenders will be allowed to register their cars as long as they have initiated a payment plan.
Assemblyman Tom Lackey of Palmdale is introducing the bill because, from his position, a parking ticket should not have the power to ruin someone’s life.
The citations put many drivers “in the unfair position of deciding between illegally driving an unregistered vehicle or not driving at all,” the legislative fact sheet argues. “This vicious cycle limits drivers’ access to daily necessities such as employment and school.”
So state leaders have created laws they intend to uphold, then later increased the severity of fines and punishments to help enforce those laws. Now they are suggesting more laws to ease the harshness of those punishments.
On the flip side, people who can’t afford parking tickets are still getting them because, most likely, they are parking illegally without much thought to the consequences. If a parking ticket is going to interfere with the ability to pay rent, strenuous efforts should be made to park legally.
Read the article here.
