CPD Writing Fewer Parking Tickets, LAZ Writing More
With less Chicago police officers doing more work trying to keep up with increases in city crime, it’s no surprise that cops are writing even fewer parking tickets than last year.
15% fewer than last year, which comes on top of a 20% drop in 2010, according to a report in the Chicago Sun-Times.
But even though police issued parking tickets are down, city Parking Enforcement Aides along with employees for the private contractor SERCO are on pace to write more parking violations than they did last year.
While PEA and SERCO ticketing is up marginally, the biggest percentage increase in ticket writing is coming from LAZ Parking who, as contractors for Chicago Parking Meters, LLC are allowed to issue expired parking meter violations per the parking meter lease contract.
LAZ Parking enforcement has written 72,933 meter violations as of July 31st compared to 43,947 for the same period the year before–a whopping 66% increase.
Based on their current pace, current projections have CPD writing about 155,000 less parking tickets than last year.
City spokespeople claim the increased numbers by other ticket writers will make up the difference. But, based on the current numbers so far this year, the claim doesn’t hold water.
If all numbers stay on pace, the city will come up about 180,000 parking tickets short of last year’s 2.45 million total tickets. Based on an average ticket fine of $50, this would be over $9 million less in parking ticket revenue for 2012–a tough number to digest when Chicago’s projected budget deficit is around $369 million.
Here’s the Chicago Sun-Times full story, “Chicago cops writing fewer parking tickets.” along with some raw parking ticket numbers that are interesting.
One thing that’s become very hard is determining if there is still a five minute amnesty/grace period for your first ticket for an expired meter. Some places say it ended 4/1/2011; others say it’s been extended; others say, it ended but you can still get it if you contest by mail.
I wish the city would make this clear on their site. Clearly this isn’t about parking as it is about revenues. Thank you for your site.
Chicago parking meters Enforcement staff are not allowed to write anything other than meters.
So that sort of increase is amazing when you consider that it is only 1 violation. But it’s only 72,933. And all the money from the Tickets goes to the City Fund…not LAZ. So LAZ has made the City of Chicago 3,646,650.00 in Revenue while they bill the City for every HCP vehicle in a Metered spot.
And I’m not surprised at all. CPD has over 9k Police officers….and they only wrote 1,034,435 in 2011 while PEA’s & Serco wrote 1,322,305 and LAZ Parking wrote 95,751
From : http://www.suntimes.com/news/cityhall/14373863-418/chicago-parking-tickets-and-who-issued-them.html
And it is a known fact the CPD engage in deliberate ‘slow downs’ in parking ticket activity. You only need to look at Second City Cop Blog posts about this Story that Speilman wrote.
On the flip side though…it seems like some districts write parking tickets because there is nothing better for the Cops to do at all. 016/019/018/24 come to mind. Ask any PEA (off the record and never print their name) and we will tell you the Cops in Most districts seem to Live to write Street Cleaning and Rush Hour and will even break traffic Laws and actually RUN to get to the tickets before PEA’s.
Hey Jim,
The 5-minute grace period for parking meter violations ended on 4/1/11.
Who the heck is saying the grace period has been extended. It has not. Do not believe anyone else.
This website has been encouraging City Council members to amend the law and bring the 5-minute grace period back.
Unfortunately, no new ordinance has been proposed.
Jim, can you share with us the links which incorrectly say the grace period is still in existence?
Thanks
Gotta love SERCO’s hustle, it is just a shame that some of the quality is lacking. Capt M-Plate isn’t lying either about some of the cops living for street cleaning. What really is sad, is that the Crossing Guards are just as thirsty for tickets as some of the coppers are and even practicing their tactics. 5 more seasons of Street Cleaning and I am outta here.
The 5 minute grace period is gone for good. Why? because its more profitable to not have it. And Rahm knows city drivers are too weak-willed to vote against him so why not keep nailing them for a meter that expired 1 minute ago.
There was even a case where some guy pulled into a metered spot and the metermaid wrote him a ticket as he was at the paybox. The only reason the ticket eventually got voided was because a news reporter caught the entire thing on camera and embarrassed the city with it.
I see a Crossing Guard Writing a Ticket and I am going to file a Grievance against them and my union….
It’s a division of Labor. Crossing Guards are not trained to write tickets….the Cops fill them out and the Crossing Guards just stick ticket them on the car.
Crossing Guards should be around schools and in intersections that don’t have stop lights.
Pete….you know how many PEA’s are writing Meter Tickets these days?
Not very Many unless they are detailed to the Loop…in which case that’s all there is to do…unless you are a machine like M-Plate and you know Every Little detail of each and every municipal code.
Wouldn’t a 5 minute grace period just be common sense?
Personally, I don’t drive downtown because I don’t want to have to park there. I’d rather take the El in instead of sending $5/hour out of the country to Abu Dhabi. This parking meter fiasco is a total joke, and I won’t support it.
Enforcement for profit is always corrupt.
James C. Walker, National Motorists Association, http://www.motorists.org, Ann Arbor, MI
And just wait till the speed camera tickets start. Then, part of every ticket will go to the likely contractor, Redflex Traffic Systems, Inc. Redflex’s chief consultant, Greg Goldner, just by coincidence, is one of Mayor Emanuel’s big money backers. In other words, every speed camera fine will be more ill-gotten dollars funnelled into Tiny Dancer’s re-election campaign. So much for the Rahmfather’s claim that the speed cameras were all about safety for school kids.
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-03-13/news/ct-met-resolute-emanuel-speed-cameras-20120313_1_speed-cameras-greg-goldner-red-light-cameras
The 5 minute grace period was a great idea. And the City Council should have extended it for the life time of the meter lease.
The simple fact that they didn’t is proof enough for me that every single Alderman and women that voted for the meter lease (and is still in office) should be Fired at the next election.
If only the sheeple of Chicago actually cared about having competent political representation. They will bitch about how hard they are getting screwed, and then show up at the polls and vote for whoever has a ‘D’ next to their name. Or not vote at all.
I’m not saying that Republicans are the answer to all of our problems, but it would be nice if the Democratic Machine at least had to worry about some political competition.
Pete,
Competition in any industry (including politics) always improves the quality of products and services.
There is no (or very little) competition when it comes to Chicago politics and that’s ultimately bad for the citizenry.
I am as amazed as you are that voters put up with the same crappy politicians year after year after year. As a rule of thumb, almost everyone I ever vote for loses.