Meter Mad : He Beat a Ticket--Now He’s Trying to Beat the System

Bill Stamps got moving when he received a ticket for parking outside his Hollywood home six months ago.

He went to court to beat the ticket. Then he went to work to beat the system.

Stamps formed The People for Parking Rights, a group he hopes will someday force Los Angeles’ army of parking enforcement officers into retreat.

“The system now is a sham,” said the semi-retired plumber. “They’re just extorting money out of citizens. They write parking tickets knowing they won’t hold up in court. They know you won’t take time to fight the ticket--they count on you paying.”

That charge is denied by city parking officials, who are the traditional targets of motorists angered to find their cars ticketed or towed from streets around the city. Officials say they encourage drivers who feel they have been wronged to take their cases to court. Those who prefer not to take that step are encouraged to promptly pay their fines.

At $13, $23, $28 and $53 a clip, thousands of motorists have done just that each day. And as of last week, fees in three of those categories became even more costly. Mayor Tom Bradley announced last Friday that bails for meter violations have been increased from $13 to $18, red zone violations from $28 to $53 and handicap zone offenses from $53 to $103.

About 4.5 million parking violation notices will have been slapped on windshields in 1989 by the city’s 564 gray-uniformed parking enforcement officers, municipal officials estimate. The city will end up collecting about 3 million of those tickets from motorists, who will have paid about $100 million in fines--bails that are legally forfeited when they opt not to show up in court to contest their citations.

Recipients of about 60,000 of this year’s tickets will have tried to fight their citations in Municipal Court, officials say. Statistics indicate that only about 34% of them will be winners. Many win their cases only because the roving parking officers who write their citations fail to appear in court to testify on the scheduled trial day. When that happens, tickets are automatically dismissed and bail money is refunded.

That’s what happened to the ticket tucked under the windshield wiper on Bill Stamps’ 1972 Ford Falcon van one Friday morning last May.

Because of street sweeping, parking is prohibited Thursday mornings on one side of Mariposa Avenue and Friday mornings on the other. Stamps said his truck was legally parked on the Thursday side when it was ticketed.

Although Stamps said he has often been rankled by parking tickets, his alleged street-sweeping violation was particularly irksome. “I wanted to confront the people who accused me,” he said. “I never had that opportunity. I never got my due process.”

The result was The People for Parking Rights. The organization has had a modest send-off since then. Stamps and his friends have tacked small notices to bulletin boards at schools and supermarkets seeking people who feel “victimized” by parking tickets.

Those who call are asked to write “paid under protest” on checks sent to the city to cover their fines. They are instructed to send photocopies of both the check and the ticket to The People for Parking Rights.

So far, about 150 drivers have done just that, Stamps said. The group has about 30 active members who pay no dues but volunteer their services for typing and announcement-posting. When the group gathers 1,000 of the photocopies, Stamps said, he plans to approach the Los Angeles City Council to demand parking enforcement reforms.

For starters, Stamps said, the fledgling organization wants an end to the “stacking” of parking regulation signs that cause confusion by listing conflicting restrictions. They also want parking officers to use official time stamps on tickets--particularly those written for parking meter violations. Such items, Stamps said, would keep officers from writing violations before drivers have a chance to hurry out and feed their meters.

The group is seeking a new system of administrative hearings instead of court trials for drivers who want to dispute tickets. And they want the current bail requirement dropped, with drivers released on their own recognizance--without paying fines--while they protest their citations.

Parking officials say all of those demands are either unnecessary or unworkable.

Robert R. Yates, the city’s parking administrator, who has listened to more than his share of grumbling from irate drivers, said he has never heard of The People for Parking Rights. He disputed suggestions that parking enforcement procedures need to be overhauled.

Yates said the city Department of Transportation already uses administrative hearings to referee some parking disputes. He said the city has also set up three locations where drivers can be relieved from paying bail by signing a form promising to appear in court.

According to Yates, no synchronized and non-adjustable portable time stamp exists that could be used on current ticket forms. But he said his officers may soon test an electronic ticket writer that will print out the time, along with other details of alleged infractions, on a computerized citation.

Yates acknowledged that seemingly contradictory parking signs posted on some streets can be confusing. But there is no way, he said, to list such things as street sweeping times, tow-away warnings or special neighborhood parking restrictions on a single sign.

Stamps said that additional parking enforcement changes will be proposed as his organization grows. Members predict there will be no shortage of suggestions.

Los Angeles taxi driver Larry Shorts is upset that cabbies receive $53 tickets for discharging passengers in a rush hour no-stopping zone in front of the downtown Greyhound bus station. He said it is dangerous to make fares walk any distance along Skid Row with their luggage.

A similar case, heard last week at the Los Angeles Traffic Court on South Hill Street, showed just how far parking enforcement officials and aggrieved motorists may have to go before they make peace.

The parking squabble started on the street next to the Hollywood Bowl four months ago, ending last Wednesday in a hallway next to the courthouse elevator after limousine driver Dayna Campo was found guilty of stopping in a no-stopping zone on Highland Avenue by Acting Judge Douglas W. Weitzman.

In court, Campo, a Torrance resident, asserted that she was traveling about 1 m.p.h. outside a Rod Stewart concert when parking enforcement Officer Jerry Dodd improperly ticketed her July 31. Dodd argued that Campo was stopped among a cluster of double-parked limos on the street.

After Weitzman assessed a reduced fine of $28 and promised that the rest of Campo’s $53 bail would be refunded, the two left the courtroom, continuing their debate by the elevator.

They both got in the last word as they climbed into separate elevators.

“I was moving,” said Campo. “She was stopped,” said Dodd.