Seattle Crime Reports : Seattle Crime Blog : Seattle, Washington

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Well, the City of Seattle is back at it.

Already one of the most incompetent bureaucratic institutions since Tammany Hall, the city recently lost a court case that may require it to reimburse up to $500,000 to local citizens who were issued parking tickets on holidays.

The city has offered no excuse...and what could they really say? I'm shocked that they even tried to fight this in court. It seems pretty cut and dry. It's a holiday...people don't need to pay for parking on holidays...don't issue parking tickets for not paying on holidays. Simple enough.

It's pretty clear to me that this was an attempt by the city to bulk up the budget.  How they thought they would get away with it is beyond me.  This wasn't a couple of people, this was thousands of people.

If you received a parking ticket on the following dates, you may qualify for a refund.

• Nov. 28, 2003
  
• July 5, 2004
  
• Nov. 26, 2004
  
• Dec. 24, 2004
  
• Dec. 31, 2004
  
• Nov. 25, 2005
  
• Dec. 26, 2005
  
• Jan. 2, 2006

If you receive a refund, send a shout out to Colette Turner. She's the woman who first brought about the lawsuit after getting a parking ticket on New Year's Eve. Kudos Colette.

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Walking to work on Tuesday morning, I came across a row of "No Parking" signs near the corner of 17th & Denny that appeared to have popped up overnight. Nothing too suspicious...except that somebody in the neighborhood is disputing their legitimacy. Affixed with tape to each sign was the following note:

For those who can't read the message, it says:

According to SPD Parking Enforcement, these mysterious "no parking" signs are not on file as required in order to be enforceable. Park away, neighbors.

This was discovered by speaking with Supervisor Miller, at 3:10 p.m. Monday 4/14 (684-5086).

S.D.O.T. Street Use Division was notified and will investigate the unauthorized signs within 48 hours.

Such signs are simply rented from National Barricade. SPD must be notified 24hrs prior to the signs taking effect, but SPD was not notified at all. The signs are required to display contact information for the party who deployed them but clearly these do not, so we cannot find out who put them here or why. I did not ask about those farther south, but these on the 100 block of 17th Ave E and 1800 block of 17th Ave are definitely not authorized.

The note, signed local resident Phil Mocek, implied that SDOT would be "investigating" in the next 48 hours. Maybe they did, or maybe they didn't. But somebody took action.

On the way to work this morning, the "No Parking" signs were still blocking off a good portion of the curbside real estate. Yet Phil's dictum on parking liberation, a copy of which had been attached to each sign, wasn't so lucky:

Yup. That's a stack of Phil's notes, crumpled and thrown in the dirt. Now, one can't help but wonder: are the signs legitimate, and Supervisor Miller's statement contrary just the result of a communication lapse within city government? Or is someone on Capitol Hill stealing parking spots and hastily destroying any evidence exposing their trickery?

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Either I'm in a laughing mood, or local crime news has been particularly hilarious lately.

There's a piece in today's Times about the latest weapon to assist Seattle meter maids in their valiant quest to enforce parking laws: Segway scooters.

I always thought SPD's contempt for parking cops could not be more apparent than it already was: after all, having to ride the city streets in those euro-boxes they use now seems like the ultimate humiliation. "No, you don't get a gun, rookie...and what's more, you'll be making your rounds in one of these." 

I was wrong. Good work, Seattle: if you really wanted to find a way to make people respect parking enforcement even less, then the six Segways - which according to The Times cost $5,000 a pop - were a worthwhile use of our city's funds.

Luckily Seattle isn't the parking enforcement laughing stock of America...turns out the machine that even our country's president couldn't handle is popping in law enforcement circles everywhere. Segway says that their "personal transporters" are used by "more than 100 police agencies worldwide," from New York to Texas to Chicago (as pictured at right).

Locally, cops seem to like the battery-powered scooters:

"I love it. You can get around town nicely," [Officer Minh] Doan said. "You don't have to fight traffic, you don't have to find parking, and it saves a lot of gas. You cover a lot more ground than you do on foot."

Or maybe Doan is just making the most out of his embarrassing situation.

Perhaps the best part out of all of this is the fact that the Segways have flashing red and blue lights on them.  I mean, seriously. You know those police videos where a cop tries to ram a car and ends up spinning out himself? Just picture that...but replace the fleeing vehicle with a running bum and the cop car with a Segway. Comedy gold.