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Hate Parking Tickets? Fixed Fights Them In Court For You

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Re: Hate Parking Tickets? Fixed Fights Them In Court For You

#91

Post by velis_vel »

eigenvector wrote: post #73
DanBC wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have never quite understood the problem with speed traffic cameras. There's a problem if they're set too close to the speed limit for that road, but other than that they only catch people committing a criminal offence. The problem there is not the speed camera, it is either an inappropriate limit on a particular stretch of road or the speed limit law in total. In England speed cameras have gone through a few weird…

Opposition to speed-limit cameras exposes the absurdity of most speed-limit laws: it's a law so bad many (most?) people are opposed to having it strictly enforced. If that's not a bad law, then I don't know what is.

> Opposition to speed-limit cameras exposes the absurdity of most speed-limit laws: it's a law so bad many (most?) people are opposed to having it strictly enforced. If that's not a bad law, then I don't know what is.

Not all laws that are heavily disliked are bad laws, and not all laws that most people like are good ones.

Re: Hate Parking Tickets? Fixed Fights Them In Court For You

#92

Post by DanBC »

eigenvector wrote: post #73
DanBC wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have never quite understood the problem with speed traffic cameras. There's a problem if they're set too close to the speed limit for that road, but other than that they only catch people committing a criminal offence. The problem there is not the speed camera, it is either an inappropriate limit on a particular stretch of road or the speed limit law in total. In England speed cameras have gone through a few weird…

Opposition to speed-limit cameras exposes the absurdity of most speed-limit laws: it's a law so bad many (most?) people are opposed to having it strictly enforced. If that's not a bad law, then I don't know what is.

I'm not sure how you can claim that most people are opposed to speed limits being enforced.

Especially in the UK.

Re: Hate Parking Tickets? Fixed Fights Them In Court For You

#93

Post by scarmig »

stinkytaco wrote: post #61
SeanLuke wrote: post #45

> There’s an argument to be made that fighting parking tickets just takes money from the community. There's no good argument along these lines. The social good of tickets is as a punitive measure to keep order. Tickets as a revenue mechanism is a social ill, full stop: it promotes the creation of bad law and corruption specifically designed to raise revenue. It's the same awfulness which results in speed traps, perma…

>Tickets as a revenue mechanism is a social ill, full stop I never buy an argument that is so simple. Tickets are a revenue source and that keeps taxes lower on the backs of people who flaunt the law. If the alternative is New York where parking is such a cluster it's an impediment to business, I think I might take the corruption. It's a far more nuanced problem than you're making it. Political oversight of revenue s…

Political oversight is the issue: to supply revenue, a politician is given a choice, between raising taxes and issuing more fines. Raising taxes is always a difficult battle, while jaywalkers or people who speed on the highway make a convenient target. So the latter happens more than it should.

These tickets disproportionately target the poor, who have the hardest time paying them on short notice, leading to additional fines that accumulate and build on each other. So officials are incentivized to either game the system by doling out tickets more than is socially productive or by targeting people who are most likely to pay back the most in fines.

The revenue has to go somewhere, but it absolutely should not go into the pockets of the agency issuing the fines. Where should it go? Best case would be to reimburse the people harmed by the social ill that's being fined: that level of targeting is hard, leaning toward impossible. Next best is to give everyone an equal share of the fines: this is also difficult, and overly costly for what would amount to a couple bucks. Third best would be to have it go into the government's general fund, to the exclusion of the agency issuing the fines. Fourth best would be going straight to the general fund.

Second worst is giving it to the agency issuing the tickets, which is where we're at now. Worst of all would be allowing the officers issuing the fine to pocket it themselves, which leads to the lowest levels of ability to audit and the most perverse and misaligned incentives.

Re: Hate Parking Tickets? Fixed Fights Them In Court For You

#94

Post by stinkytaco »

dangrossman wrote: post #89
stinkytaco wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also easy to chalk up thousands of perfectly legitimate parking tickets to a few incompetent/corrupt parking authorities that you have no evidence exist except anecdotal experiences. I’ve now read a half a dozen comments in this thread that I can sum up as "I once got a parking ticket that I shouldn't have, all parking authorities are incompetent and corrupt." No one's telling you that you shouldn't be allowed t…

> No one's telling you that you shouldn't be allowed to challenge a ticket I think that's exactly what the person I responded to was saying. If obeying the law never results in being issued a ticket, there's no reason they should allow tickets to be challenged.

I'm not sure where you get that at all. I really see no one anywhere saying anything like that.

The starter of this thread is clearly being tongue in cheek.

The next person was addressing that by arguing that corruption causes people to get unnecessary parking tickets.

The next one was saying that he was overstating that because he himself had managed to avoid that (side note: so have I).

I don't think: "you should not be allowed any redress on parking tickets" was ever broached.

What I take out of this is that there are bad parking tickets and there is a system for dealing with bad parking tickets. No system is perfect, all systems have compromises, design flaws and humans who make real mistakes implementing them.

Accepting this I personally feel revenue from parking tickets is an excellent way to keep taxes lower. I happen to see this process in action as part of my employment, so perhaps I am biased. I have also seen places who basically feel the way you do about parking enforcement and I do not like it (I’m looking at New York here). I will take the tradeoffs and if I choose not to, I will address the problems with my elected officials whose job it is to oversee the budget process to avoid exactly the kinds of corruption we’re speculating exists.

Re: Hate Parking Tickets? Fixed Fights Them In Court For You

#95

Post by dangrossman »

stinkytaco wrote: post #94
dangrossman wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No one's telling you that you shouldn't be allowed to challenge a ticket I think that's exactly what the person I responded to was saying. If obeying the law never results in being issued a ticket, there's no reason they should allow tickets to be challenged.

I'm not sure where you get that at all. I really see no one anywhere saying anything like that. The starter of this thread is clearly being tongue in cheek. The next person was addressing that by arguing that corruption causes people to get unnecessary parking tickets. The next one was saying that he was overstating that because he himself had managed to avoid that (side note: so have I). I don't think: "you should n…

> corruption we’re speculating exists

We're not speculating. I live in a suburb of Philadelphia. Last summer our traffic courts were permanently closed, their cases turned over to the municipal court system. 9 of the traffic court judges, and 3 other city officials, were indicted on criminal charges related to fraud and corruption.

Re: Hate Parking Tickets? Fixed Fights Them In Court For You

#96

Post by stinkytaco »

scarmig wrote: post #93
stinkytaco wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Tickets as a revenue mechanism is a social ill, full stop I never buy an argument that is so simple. Tickets are a revenue source and that keeps taxes lower on the backs of people who flaunt the law. If the alternative is New York where parking is such a cluster it's an impediment to business, I think I might take the corruption. It's a far more nuanced problem than you're making it. Political oversight of revenue s…

Political oversight is the issue: to supply revenue, a politician is given a choice, between raising taxes and issuing more fines. Raising taxes is always a difficult battle, while jaywalkers or people who speed on the highway make a convenient target. So the latter happens more than it should. These tickets disproportionately target the poor, who have the hardest time paying them on short notice, leading to addition…

People keep saying this, but I really have nothing more than anecdotal evidence to believe that it is true. But seriously, if you are concerned, that is why we have a democratic process. Deal with it in the election.

>Fourth best would be going straight to the general fund.

I'm curious where you think it goes? I have worked at a number of municipalities and all revenue goes to the general fund. During the budget process departments predict expected revenue. This is taken into account when setting the city budget overall (which also takes into account tax revenue and reserves). No money "goes into the department's pockets". They account for it and turn it over to the city's auditor. Those fees go into providing city services, it's not like they are lining someone's pocket.

My issue is the term "full stop". That is not a good way to deal with problem solving in the real world. I have been to municipalities where there is little to no parking enforcement or that have very lax parking laws (ahem, New York) and I don't personally find it pleasant. No system is perfect, they all require political oversight and constant vigilance, but most states have open records laws that allow you (or local press) the audit these processes and the revenue raised. All systems should have recourse in case of design flaw or human flaw. All systems should have the final say rest with citizens through their elected officials.

Re: Hate Parking Tickets? Fixed Fights Them In Court For You

#97

Post by stinkytaco »

dangrossman wrote: post #95
stinkytaco wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure where you get that at all. I really see no one anywhere saying anything like that. The starter of this thread is clearly being tongue in cheek. The next person was addressing that by arguing that corruption causes people to get unnecessary parking tickets. The next one was saying that he was overstating that because he himself had managed to avoid that (side note: so have I). I don't think: "you should n…

> corruption we’re speculating exists We're not speculating. I live in a suburb of Philadelphia. Last summer our traffic courts were permanently closed, their cases turned over to the municipal court system. 9 of the traffic court judges, and 3 other city officials, were indicted on criminal charges related to fraud and corruption.

Good, I'm sure they should be indicted.

But that does not indict all parking tickets everywhere or the system of issuing parking tickets. It indicts a suburb of Philadelphia.

It's like saying that when a sports official gets a call wrong (or even worse, is corrupt), it indicts every team that's ever played that sport and the very act of playing that sport.

Re: Hate Parking Tickets? Fixed Fights Them In Court For You

#98

Post by jjcm »

rmrfrmrf wrote: post #11

I hate parking tickets so much that I follow posted signs and obey traffic laws.

If you've lived in SF for any period of time, you'll know just how difficult obeying parking signs there actually is. There are zones which you need decals for to park during certain hours, but even if you have that decal you still have banned hours which vary per street in order to have the streets cleaned.

Going out of town for the weekend? Make sure you call your friend and arrange to have your car moved once or twice while you're gone. Working late? Better move your parked car in case you're in the wrong zone outside of daylight hours. Having a car required more maintenance than having a cat when I was living there. Even if I wasn't using my car at all, I'd often have to move it three to four times a week just to avoid tickets. I ended up getting about one or two a month while there.

Re: Hate Parking Tickets? Fixed Fights Them In Court For You

#99

Post by dangrossman »

stinkytaco wrote: post #97
dangrossman wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> corruption we’re speculating exists We're not speculating. I live in a suburb of Philadelphia. Last summer our traffic courts were permanently closed, their cases turned over to the municipal court system. 9 of the traffic court judges, and 3 other city officials, were indicted on criminal charges related to fraud and corruption.

Good, I'm sure they should be indicted. But that does not indict all parking tickets everywhere or the system of issuing parking tickets. It indicts a suburb of Philadelphia. It's like saying that when a sports official gets a call wrong (or even worse, is corrupt), it indicts every team that's ever played that sport and the very act of playing that sport.

If that's what I had tried to imply, you'd have a point. Instead, I'm arguing with someone who says there's no evidence of corruption but a few anecdotes, by providing an example proving otherwise. That was the city of Philadelphia for the record, not just the suburb I live in. Big court, millions of citizens, state legislature had to step in to stop the corruption. And it's not the only ticketing authority in the nation with bonafide, verifiable corruption. You're spreading misinformation by repeatedly making that assertion that it's all speculation.

> It's not like they are walking into your driveway and giving you a ticket.

Yeah, they actually do that too [Google: 19,600 results for ticket "parked in my own driveway", and personal experience]. You're either overtly biased by your employment where you're taking part in this revenue, or you're wholly ignorant of what it's like to park regularly in some of the largest cities in this nation. Either way, your commentary is uninformed.

Re: Hate Parking Tickets? Fixed Fights Them In Court For You

#100

Post by splat »

eli wrote: post #81
splat wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It all depends. What if it's three o'clock in the morning and you've been waiting at a light for five minutes and its not turning and you can see that no one's coming in the other direction?

Yeah, sorry, I still don't think that's OK. There may be reasons for running a red light, but "it's late and I'm impatient" isn't one of them.

As a cyclist, though, sometimes the light will never turn. Most states treat bicycles identically to cars as far as red lights go. So, sorry, but I'm not going to wait at a red light for 45 minutes when it's freezing out for a car to show up and switch the light for me.
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