For This Job, Better Park Your Temper

Parking enforcement officers face plenty of put-downs from the drivers they ticket:

Don’t you have anything better to do?

You like your job, don’t you?

Did you go to college for this?

That last line really bothers Manny Garcia of the Los Angeles Department of Transportation’s San Fernando Valley Parking Enforcement office. He has not been to college but plans to attend someday.

“They always go for that education thing,” said Garcia, 25. “They try to belittle you, that you’re the lowest thing on earth because they’re getting a ticket.”

In just one year as a traffic officer, Garcia has learned to become a master of restraint. When insulted or threatened, he is trained to de-escalate the situation by walking away.

“You just bite your lips,” Garcia said. “You don’t say anything. It will get you in trouble.”

Issuing those fines can be hazardous. Officers have been pushed, spat on, and had their cars kicked by angry motorists. Their main protection is their radios, which can summon police, and their street smarts.

Selected officers and supervisors have been carrying pepper spray since September under a yearlong pilot program, officials said. They may use the spray only as a last resort when facing “a clear threat of bodily harm” from people or animals. No officers have had to use the spray, department leaders said.

The tense work environment keeps Garcia on his toes. When he leaves his car for a while, he always rolls up the windows and locks the doors--precautions against theft and vandalism. Recently, a vandal dumped feces in the unattended car of an officer who had left the windows open, he said. Garcia’s car has been pelted with eggs and smeared with ketchup and mustard.

From Marine Corps to Parking Patrol

Garcia said he endures the abuse because he likes the stability and retirement benefits of a city job. He takes his mission seriously, keeping his beige-and-blue uniform crisply ironed, his blue cap clean, his black shoes polished and his hair closely cropped--all habits he picked up as a U.S. Marine Corps sergeant.

Before becoming a traffic officer, Garcia was a courier for an air-mail company. His cousin, also a traffic officer, told him the job was easy and he could make good money. The starting annual salary is $31,500, but veteran officers can make up to $70,000 with overtime.

A recent Monday morning started peacefully as Garcia responded to radio complaints in his city-owned white Chevrolet Cavalier. He spotted a blue Chevy pickup truck parked illegally in the frontyard of a house on Tyrone Avenue in Van Nuys. As a courtesy, Garcia knocked on the front door to ask the resident to move the truck before issuing a citation.

When no one answered, Garcia entered the truck license plate and vehicle identification numbers into his hand-held computer, which contains a wireless printer that spews out a hard copy of the citation within minutes.

Suddenly the front door opened and a man in his 20s walked out onto the porch. He was wearing glasses and black jeans. No shirt or shoes.

“I rang the doorbell. I knocked five times,” Garcia said to the resident and explained why he was giving him a ticket.

The man gave a bemused smile. Then he realized this wasn’t a joke.

“All right, man. Get out of here,” the resident said. He began swearing at Garcia as he walked toward his truck to see the $35 ticket under the driver’s side windshield wiper. “I hope somebody cites you.”

Garcia got back into his car and turned on the ignition. The man swaggered toward the back of the car and shouted more expletives as Garcia drove off.

Garcia seemed frustrated rather than scared by the episode. He was also annoyed at the feeling of always getting it wrong, even while trying to get it right.

“Even when you try to give a courtesy, they get on you,” Garcia said.

“If you have a short temper in this job you just might go off, which is not what you want. As long as they don’t swing, you’re all right,” said Garcia, who lives with his parents in Inglewood.

Business Districts, Schools Targeted

Officers have ample opportunity to provoke drivers’ ire, as they patrol the city 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They regularly seek out offenders in commercial areas and around schools, where higher demand for parking requires stricter enforcement, said Parking Enforcement Chief Jimmy L. Price. Officers patrol residential areas mostly during street cleaning hours and in response to complaints, he said.

Though an unpopular bunch, the city’s 529 traffic officers certainly fill the coffers. In the 1999-00 fiscal year, Los Angeles drivers paid the city more than $113 million in parking fines, a gain of more than $88 million for the city’s general fund after paying fees to government agencies and to the private contractor that processes the citations, according to the city Office of Parking Management. The year before, the fund netted $91 million.

Garcia doesn’t carry pepper spray and said he hasn’t been assaulted. But some angry drivers have ominously warned him, “Stray bullets kill.” Sweet-talking, petite women have tried grabbing his hand-held ticket computer, he said.

Despite the potential for violence, only one traffic officer has died in the line of duty in recent years. In May 1997, 47-year-old Henry Medina was accidentally struck and killed by a car while impounding an illegally parked vehicle in Hollywood. Several officers have been seriously injured, usually in traffic accidents, and transferred to less demanding work or retired, Price said.

About 60 Tickets a Day

Amid the hazards, Garcia keeps busy.

He issues an average of 60 citations a day, mostly $40 tickets for parking at the curb during street cleaning hours. He also directs traffic during special events, when street lights go out and when police or fire officials need him to protect an emergency perimeter. Despite having to stand near whizzing vehicles, it’s his favorite part of the job.

“It takes off the monotony of writing tickets and people screaming at you,” Garcia said. “I always get thank-yous. It’s like a morale booster.”