Does this country, it's lawyers, and its judiciary, not have better things to do than litigate chalking tires?
5
“Nobody should touch my car,” the plaintiff complains. If touching is a violation of the 4th Amendment, how does an officer leave a ticket on your car? Wouldn’t they have to put it under your wiper blade?
3
@Tracy
If the officer writes you a ticket, then you've done something illegal. That's much different than what's being discussed here, where a perfectly-legally-parked car is having its tire defaced.
7
Not a personal attack, but perhaps Alison should spend a bit more time walking in order to avoid putting stress on the healthcare system in Saginaw.
20
Follow the money. This case isn't about parking or chalk or the fourth amendment. A federal civil rights statute provides for an award of legal fees to the winning plaintiff's attorney, to be paid by the city defendant. This is actually a suit for a fee by the lawyer; the motorist is incidental to the case. A court will typically award $500 to $750 for every hour the lawyer claims to have worked on the case.
4
I was glad to learn what made chalking unconstitutional. I agree that the chalk is just a low tech GPS device. However I disagree with the judges that no public good is involved. I share the opinion of other commenters that the city is trying to allocate a valuable public resource fairly.
7
So the border patrol, with the blessings of the Supreme Court, have found it totally ok to inspect your vehicle and confiscate your electronics within an arbitrary 100 miles of any international border, but drawing chalk lines on your tires to mark that you’ve been parked too long is a violation of your fourth amendment rights. What a country!
19
Seems like the obvious solution is a city ordinance with subsequent signage that says if you want 2 hours of free parking on the street you are consenting to your tire being chalked.
11
We have express E-Pass in New Jersey in which a camera can read your plate as you pass by at 70 mph and Bill your account. Seems easy enough for a parking cop to drive around town at regular speeds noting which cars are parked and which cars have exceeded the permitted time and send them a bill. E-Z pass can be connected to credit cards so the bill isn’t necessary. I wonder if this court ruling was paid for by the folks who sell plate readers because I doubt the chalk sellers have much clout.
2
How is it that the government can constitutionally force women and girls to remain pregnant despite serious and potentially long term risks to physical and/or mental health while chalking a tire is declared unconstitutional? It’s ok to literally seize control of women’s bodies and lives but chalking a tire is a violation of the freedoms promised by our founding documents?
14
I consider myself a civil libertarian but this case does not make sense. The jones case was a product of Scalias absurd originalism. Fourth amendment violations should be based upon one’s reasonable expectation of privacy. Even in that case the intrusion was a device placed on the car in a place that was not visible to the public. Your cars tire is exposed to the public as is the fact that your car is parked on a public street. At most the city should be liable for the”damage “ done to your tire by the chalk mark
7
This argument is nonsense, nothing but false distinctions, lawyerly whining & willful ignorance. Doubtless the unrestricted free lot is a few hundred steps further, and for this great "hardship" - healthy exercise rather - all the nation's local governments must screech to a halt.
I don't like parking tickets either, but timed parking regulations exist for a reason, and are meaningless if not enforced. The reason lest we forget is to allow customers access to local businesses, people who come and go throughout the day. By contrast these confessed law breaking yet self righteous parking space squatters interfere with business healthy circulation of vehicles.
You draw on a public resource, you get your free ticket punched for doing so. It's called respecting the commons. While by contrast those chronically discourteous to their neighbors should be held accountable.
And far from there being anything "arbitrary and inefficient" about chaulk, it is simple, elegant and low tech. You can keep your pointless, expensive, failure prone electronic alternative.
Tire chaulk actually makes me nostolgic for the small town life of my childhood from which one of my earliest memories is of a motorcycle officer cruising slowly along main street with a long, light handle tipped with chaulk leaving a bright blue dab on every other rear tire. A brilliant bit of traffic engineering explained to me at age five that to my view holds up just fine 56 years later.
6
It's hard to have much respect for the law and the constitution anymore with judges and lawyers making such a mockery out of it with how they play their games with and contrive their own interpretations of it. And all brought about but a woman who has no intention whatsoever to abide by them because she's too lazy to move her car like the rest of us?
15
It's hard to have much respect for the law and the constitution anymore with judges and lawyers making such a mockery out of it with how they play their games with and contrive their own interpretations of it. And all brought about but a woman who has no intention whatsoever to abide by them because she's too lazy to move her car like the rest of us?
@John Doe This was not brought about by the woman who had gotten numerous tickets. The article explains this.
1
Maybe the police should focus on the glass breakers outside the liquor store.
Maybe the town should clean the parking lot and make it safe to park.
6
Congratulations, Ms Taylor: Using a legal loophole and some chutzpah, you've make it vastly easier for greedy individuals to grab more than their fair share of a shared, public resource.
7
@RR Um, no she did not. The courts decided this. The attorneys contacted her for THEIR lawsuit.
1
Congratulations, Ms Taylor: Using a legal loophole and some chutzpah, you've make it vastly easier for greedy individuals to grab more than their fair share of a shared, public resource.
How can there only be probable cause to make chalk marks on cars that, at that time, are parked illegally?! What self-respecting judge could take such a position? Are officers only allowed to check a car's speed if the car is travelling above the speed limit? I hope very much this heads up to the Supreme Court! It will give them a chance to tidy up Jones, as well.
1
@RH the chalked cars were parked LEGALLY at the time of chalking. LEGALLY. What would be the point of chalking a car that is already eligible for a ticket? You should re-read the article.
As for checking speeds, a device is not physically placed ON the vehicles. The court decision pertains to devices and markings placed ON the vehicles.
2
So Saginaw and other places will buy APRs, Automated Plate Readers, as many other municipalities have - and to pay for those, the cost of parking tickets will rise. The college I teach in and the city I live in have moved to APRs, and parking tickets now start at $48, and go up!
5
How exactly is chalking a tire is in any sense a search, in any sense a seizure, or in any sense unreasonable?
2
@polymath The article explains it, but you'd have to read it.
@JP I read it but I still don't see how chalk is illegal search and seizure. The explanation didn't make sense to me.
2
Congratulation Ms. Taylor. In your zeal to avoid playing by the rules at all costs, you just made life more difficult for yourself and everyone else.
If this decision sticks, then your hometown and many, many others will have to invest in new technology if they want to enforce their parking rules. That means money spent at the expense of something else within their safety enforcement budget. Assuming the city acquires such technology, you'll probably then see even more tickets issued, and it be much harder for you or anyone else to claim innocence for parking overtime. Time-stamped pictures, automated license plate detection, etc., is much more efficient and accurate than Lovely Rita coming around every once in a awhile and checking to see if a chalk mark on a tire is present or has moved.
As usual, selfish people don't take the time or mental energy to consider the "watch what you ask for" aspects of the alternatives to the so-called injustices they endure.
The way you're heading, I expect you'll get towed at some point, then it's off to court again for you. Enjoy.
Thanks for nothing.
7
These complainers are not paying for parking at this time and wish to be able to monopolize limited space making it not available for others. So if their town now installs meters, parking will cost them and the parking checkers will know how long they have been there just by a different method! Here in Concord, NH we have metered parking. The newest are smart meters that take credit cards. The old system require walking to a kiosk, inserting a card or money and taking the stamped receipt which then had to be put on the dashboard. A frustrating system when raining or snowing, but having the advantage that one could move to a different location and still have paid parking time to use. No perfect system, but those with handicapped parking plates or hang tags do not have to pay which is a good thing.
4
Cities could do like San Francisco and, with increasing frequency, Sacramento, and eliminate all free street parking. Why should the citizens and workers get anything free? After all, even though we pay taxes to maintain the roads and pay parking cops' salaries, we still have to pay for the privilege of using our city streets - by the hour. In addition, when you receive a ticket in error, you will lose your court battle even if you have photographic evidence or a note from God Himself. I absolutely don't believe that eliminating all paid parking would hurt businesses. In San Francisco, it will speed up the push to eliminate cars altogether from certain districts.
4
If I were in Ms. Taylor’s shoes I would have fought the parking tickets and contacted the local town or city administrators. She is working with a serious health issue and needs handicapped parking allowance. Bringing a lawsuit - well, she won.
2
Your vehicle is personal property, the same as your house. Whether it is used as a tool, parked in your garage and filled with junk, or parked on a city street, it is still personal property, and you have a constitutional right against illegal search and seizure. By marking your tires, the city is engaging in a search effort.
A more efficient method of collecting parking fees and assisting in writing parking tickets is to install pay-by-phone Parking meters. The parking spaces can be paid by phone or by change, they are easy, accurate and save time. Open the app, enter the space number, enter the amount of time you wish to park (up to the time limit) and enter a credit card number. Done. The app can save your payment info for next time, and it aslo saves the streets and space numbers you frequent. The BEST part is that the app can remind you when your meter needs to be replenished and you can do it from wherever you are.
They are everywhere in Seattle. I now live in a very small city, Bellingham, Wa, and even we have installed pay-by-phone in certain areas of the city. No more standing in the rain to load change, and no more running/sloshing back and forth to check your tires. The cities that have installed pay-by-phone parking meters love them and install more as they can. Drivers love them and wish they were installed everywhere there is paid parking.
2
@seattlesweetheart Presumably Bellingham provides each resident with a phone capable of making these payments at no cost to the resident. Otherwise it in effect is imposing an obligatory payment (tax?) on residents, a tax ironically paid to a private entity otherwise known as the phone company. Not everyone has a mobile phone and it is inappropriate to require them to access public services.
7
"By marking your tires, the city is engaging in a search effort."
By that logic, so is reading your license plate.
4
@polymath Your logic is faulty. Reading a plate does not require physically placing a device or marking on the vehicle. So you missed the point.
1
If you’ve ever searched for a parking space so you could run into your favorite bakery for a quick purchase, this ruling is infuriating. The on-street parking limit is there to encourage turnover and allow convenient parking for local businesses. That makes perfect sense. But one selfish driver, who just doesn’t like the free all-day parking available across the street, decides that she is entitled to park wherever she wants for as long as she pleases. She and an attorney concoct a charge that is (dubiously) technically accurate but clearly a ruse. They tie up our already jammed court system so she continue her lazy ways and deprive shoppers of the spaces they need. (And they’ll go off to the mall or superstore that’s already challenging downtown businesses for survival.) The photo of the poor “plaintiff” leaning on her SUV, and the fact that she racked up 14 violations already, says it all: my personal needs and aversion to walking across the street to park are more important than the common good, the parking ordinances, and the local business community. Shame on the court for even hearing such a ridiculous case, let alone siding with the “aggrieved” parker.
53
@Ed The officers can take note of parked cars, and refer to those notes two hours later and issue tickets to those who are over parked.
Easy. And legal.
But wouldn’t this be condemned as an illegal surveillance if the meter reader did not get a court order to to take notes?
I am sure there are enough lawyers out there like Avenatti who will take a parking ticket to that level....
1
Where I live a car can't be parked on the street for more than 24 hours. This is an area that has more multifamily housing than single family homes, and each unit gets just one parking spot. Our illustrious PD has a rotation of officers who drive around daily marking car tires, checking them the next day to see if the mark has moved. If not, automatic fine. We are also in one of the worst states in the country for civil assets forfeiture, and our local chief brags about the money our force brings in by robbing the poorest people of their private property whether they're been involved in a crime or not.
It's sickening.
38
@Jrb
That is unfair. City planning and zoning committees are often to blame for these situations. If they are proactive there will be enough parking for residents and businesses.
If they are reliant on archaic zoning laws then the laws need revision.
5
@nom de guerre - I agree that's often the case. In our town we have hardly any business, and those businesses we have are on ample land with much available parking. All of the ticketing is done on residential streets where there is no business at all. IN a two-car family if one is home sick for a couple of days, the other had better get out there and move his car every day until he's back to work. I went through it myself, tires marked every day for two weeks. It's basically another source of revenue, but harassment at its core.
One of our cops recently got Officer of the Year for writing over 3000 tickets in one year. This in a town of 2000, including children and non-drivers. They'll sit in the corner church parking lot and wait, then nail people for not coming to a full stop at a stop sign, full stop being three sets of back and forth movements of the car, and motionless after that. I always wonder if this is what they thought being a police officer was, and how much job satisfaction they have basically harassing the community they serve. I'm sure they don't see it that way.
10
While this issue can seem frivolous, it is important to keep in mind how such rulings are important because they generalize to cities of all sizes and demographics and can have significant effects.
In Los Angeles, parking tickets annually generate closer to $150 million. Ticketing here has little to do with public safety issues and mostly to do with generating revenue. My personal experiences with parking enforcement have largely been unjust, pointed attempts to generate a parking ticket. I won't burden any gentle readers here with the staggering number of ways I have been falsely ticketed and made to pay those fines (though I did manage to get one such parking ticket overturned by the City of West Hollywood). On occasion, I've encountered parking enforcement "officers" (sounds so much better than "janitor with a badge," yes?) chalking my vehicle's tire. But my observation and experiences, along with many others I know, show that "expiration" of a parking spot is subjective/not entirely accurate and a ticket was generated even though I returned to my vehicle before the allotted time limit expired.
Perhaps if the chalk method is discontinued some better accountability will result.
https://www.kcrw.com/news/articles/why-are-las-parking-tickets-so-expensive
10
I got a parking ticket in Miami, but my car had never been south of Philadelphia. Tough to fight a parking ticket when you live a thousand miles away. Just paid it. I did go to parking court in Irvington, but instead of saying equal justice under the law as it does at the Supreme Court, the sign said they accepted MasterCard or Visa. And that’s pretty much all the judge was interested in hearing: Would I be paying with MasterCard or Visa.
2
We have similar problems in our area. People like to park for free and you can't blame them. There are more cars than there are free spaces. In our village the only time parking is free and has a 2 hour limit on the free spaces is during December. And still there are problems with spaces and people getting tickets.
As absurd as this sounds, the chalking is a non-intrusive way to track who has overstayed their "welcome". It's not good for the merchants who use the local parking but that's a separate issue. The honor system doesn't work, not because most people will overstay but because a few make a habit of it.
If we had better public transportation some of this problem would disappear. We don't. We need it. We need cheap, reliable, and widespread public transportation. Perhaps a younger generation will understand better why an excellent public transportation system is better than a system of roads crowded with cars that have one or two people in them for a commute to and from work but very little use in between.
4/25/2019 1:15pm
15
Why am I not surprised that Scalia had a hand in this decision? Corporations are now people. Chalk on a tire is now an unreasonable intrusion. And up is down. I wish more had been made of the fact that Scalia, a Supreme Court Justice, died at an exclusive resort he frequented but did not pay for.
14
@It’s News Here So you're ok with the government putting you under surveillance when you have not done anything wrong? That's what you're saying.
The cars are LEGALLY PARKED when they are chalked. LEGALLY PARKED.
1
A good decision by the court. Like Ms. Taylor, I've always felt slightly violated, albeit to a very minor degree, by the chalk marks. “One, nobody should touch my car," indeed. The authorities have no right to deface someone's private property, even to a minor degree, when it is parked legally. There are other ways in which they can document vehicles that exceed the time limit.
1
This is ridiculous. If people could be trusted to follow the community guidelines, it wouldn't be needed in the first place. If it's a way to keep folks from taking up spots for unreasonable amounts of time, I don't see the issue with it. Also, if you already have a lot to park in for work but it has an issue, maybe fix the single issue rather than trying to change the country's means of tracking parking violations just because you want to park illegally.
9
@Katie
Actually, I agree with you. Usually street parking is limited in some way to allow customers to come and go; longer term parking is( usually) available in lots or garages. Since she actually has free parking - imagine that! -- the issue is to clean up the lot if it is in fact to awful to drive in.
What an absurd issue! Just what we need: more and more lawyers to do more and more useless, worthless, wasteful, and profitable work that serves no good purpose.
13
This is not a thing. Throw some tire finish on before parking downtown. Keeps the chalk from sticking.
3
Really? Are you kidding? This is not a search. Another gross overreach by "judges".
10
@Michael you realize that the argument is based on Scalia's rationale in U.S. v. Jones, so essentially you're calling Scalia an "activist" judge.
1
If anyone had a doubt that this country is going down the drain, this pretty much settles it. This is the type of nonsense with which the courts amuse themselves while they have no time to deal with financial fraud, robberies, assaults, and murders.
10
The logical response is for the city to install parking meters, forcing everyone to pay to park.
8
@Henry
In places such as White Plains, which derives good income from parking, there are 2 hour meters on the streets - and signs that indicate parking is limited to 2 hours. The parking enforcement officer chalks tires. It DOESN'T MATTER if you put more money in the meter: if your vehicle sat in place more than 2 hours, you can be issued a parking ticket.
It was aggravating, but who thought it would become a constitutional issue!
Is anything actually being unreasonably searched and seized here?
The car is not being searched. It being monitored and marked. And what is being seized?
What's next? If an officer "sees" someone in a car with a gun outside a bank, would this be unreasonable search and seizure if he takes action.
Keep this silly kind of liberalism up, people. You may just lose 2024, as well.
3
@Moderate Republican How is this liberalism? It strikes me as libertarian, or "small-government" conservatism, if anything.
10
@Moderate Republican "silly kind of liberalism" Did you note that the Supreme Court opinion used in this case was written by Antonin Scalia? (I'm not sure whether Justice Scalia would have been more insulted by "silly" or "liberalism".) Seems more like an arch-conservative limit on the power of the government than anything liberal.
As for your bank robber comparison, the Sixth Circuit specifically ruled that the search was unreasonable because parking enforcement was not an issue of public safety but of raising revenue. Potential armed robbery would not apply.
@Moderate Republican
Where on earth about this entire story did you get "silly kind of liberalism"?
A pyrrhic victory for citizens who seek to game parking rules. A giant leap for the surveillance state.
3
Wow, chalking car tires as a 4th Amendment issue. Next people will claim it is a taking because their pristine tires are being sullied and that could have an effect on the resale value of the car. Who are these activist judges that they would stretch the concept of "search and seizure" to this extend? What is the ideology driving them?
11
@Mike S. The cars are LEGALLY PARKED at the time of chalking. The drivers are being put under government surveillance JUST IN CASE they might over stay the parking time limit. JUST IN CASE.
Are you ok with the government placing a device on your car to determine if you ever exceed the speed limit? There's no reason to believe you might do so. But you're ok with it.
@JP
I'm not sure I want to live in your world where no one can do anything to prevent crime but must wait for a crime to be committed to do anything. Chalking is simply a method for letting people know the law will be enforced. No punishment is meted out to those who do not commit a crime.
This problem sounds like it can be fixed with a digital camera that has GPS and time stamps attached to the photos. Take a picture of each car, then check if it is still there 2 hours lady.
Just because the method was bizarrely ruled "an unconstitutional search," that doesn't excuse this woman's repeatedly breaking the law and exploiting public spaces.
4
Time stamps? That would require subtracting one time stamp from the other. You might be asking too much of the workers involved..... Maybe the time stamps could be entered into a computer, which could automatically output a "confirmation" if it were over the allotted parking time. Yes, that might work, assuming the data is entered in proper order.
'There is a dance that takes place every weekday in cities and towns across the country'
... nope, never once witnessed this. I've lived in major cities and tini towns that are asleep at 8 pm. not once did i see this. might be a very local thing in Michigan.
The police should just by an old Android or iPhone and snap pictures, the metadata will give GPS location, time and date. When you see the same car, take another, compare data and if over 2 hours, give her a ticket. Easy fix.
If you got 14 tickets already, chances are that any technology, old or new, will prove you needed a ticket. Park a little further up at another free parking space, walking won't hurt you and you might save some cash.
4
1) You have to be kidding in thinking that because you haven’t seen that it’s not an issue. Didn’t expect narcissism to be present in the comments section of this piece but I always allow room for surprises.
2) Your suggestion is more surveillance state apparatus. I get that it’s here but it’s another thing to willfully walk through the doors of it.
3) It’s hard to be sympathetic to those who intentionally flout the rules, that I can agree with.
3
@AutumnLeaf
What if, during the two hour period, the person ran an errand and returned to park in the same spot?
Apparently, many of the posters here have never encountered an overzealous person wearing a badge. Then explained their story to a judge only to have the badge holder lie about what happened. Then, even after providing proof to the judge, having a judge claim the badge holder was telling the truth.
American justice is any thing but just.
Beware: GESTAPO cops
2
I wonder about Ms. Taylor, who wants to park for free. I wonder about the lawyers involved, who want to devote part of their lives fighting for her right to do so. I wonder about a justice system capable of finding that a chalk mark is a search and contravenes so solemn and vital a document as the constitution. And about everyone in the whole story and the New York Times, all of whom entertain analysis of this matter with a straight face.
It's hard to say for certain, but I doubt this could happen anywhere else in the world. It seems emblematic in a way of the mounting seriousness of American confusion. Or is stupefaction an even better word?
Finally I wonder about myself, as this makes me feel like someone slowing down to gawk at roadside wreckage. But the US is so important, I had to say something, in case it might help a tiny bit. Sorry for any officiousness, but I mean well.
9
Why not put up parking meters, and charge a small reasonable amount for an initial period of time? Increase fees after that time.
5
@Dr. J How do you determine the difference between a single person returning to "reclaim" an initial period of and a new parker? That's what the chalk mark was meant to do.
The cameras that take images as cars enter and leave toll roads require a person's information to be looked up and correlated. They are not committing a crime but do receive a bill. which is not that much different from receiving a parking ticket Toll collectors did not present this issue.
5
Just think how many tickets that lady will get when the city/police start using better and more accurate enforcement methods; or does anyone believe the city is about to just leave nearly a quarter million bucks behind without so much as a whimper?. An average of 4.67 a year will be child's play!
8
"Where Ms. Taylor works, there is a lot where she could park free all day, but..."
Let me guess... the real reason she doesn't park there is that the time-limited spots are closer to the front door. Since when do we champion people who park illegally? And leave work every two hours to check on their cars?
33
@Chris
A little walk would do most of us a world of good.
2
bottom line: u.s. parking enforcement is completely pulled into the 21st century while shares in chalk manufacturers tank.
5
In Europe,we have discs, on which you indicate the time you parked. I have heard that some cities in Switzerland use cameras to make sure people do not return to their cars to change the time, even checking that you entered a road - not just the parking lot- before parking again.
This decision will undoubtedly prove costly to the community: shoppers who do not find a parking space may well take their business elsewhere, and the solutions to enforce parking rules are likely to be more expensive and less environment-friendly than chalk. A small victory for the lawyers and a petty plaintiff, and a big loss for everyone else.
13
It sounds like the city has enough parking. They just need to clean up the broken glass (or require the liquor store to do it). So they don't even have a good reason for the time limits.
7
Put aside the Constitutional issue. Would you rather have chalk on your tire or a picture of your car with time and pinpoint GPS location stored in a database, where it can be used to establish your movements and routine? I find that far more invasive than chalk marks. "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." Amendment IV. Note the word UNREASONABLE.
14
1. First, if lawful (but unnecessary) parking tickets and the related awful chalking of tires are the biggest abuses that the police dept has done in Saginaw, then its people have a good relationship/life with the police. Glad that you solved such a big issue, Saginaw ! What's next ? Puppies jay-walking ? Annoying colors on traffic lights ?
2. Do people of Saginaw realize that they did not solve at all the issue of abusive/unnecessary tickets and that they have only poked the bear ? Ok, police will not use chalking of tires anymore, which would have eased the illegal parking of cars on rainy days, but instead will take dated pictures, which will insure that all illegally parked cars get tickets. Saginaw: your problem was that police is issuing parking tickets unnecessarily ! You did NOT solve that problem ! You did NOT stop that practice !
3. So, there are some judges who accept the claim that police chalking a car's tires is an unconstitutional search,
but police towing a car is not an unconstitutional seizure. That's a very non-sensical double standard. What a country !
9
@mynameisnotsusan
After a bit more thinking, I realized that this hero Alison Taylor of Saginaw has made things much worse for her any her coworkers. Now, with a smile on their faces, Saginaw police will install parking meters in all previously-free parking spaces, so that Miss Taylor (who paid one parking fine every 3 months, after having parked illegally every working day), will have to chose between 1. parking legally everyday and pay much more for that than when she was parking illegally and was getting caught one day every three months,
and 2. parking illegally everyday and being caught much more often than before. Way to go Ms. Taylor !
You is a sharp tack !
2
@mynameisnotsusan
What a delightful series of comments. Maybe it's time to pay a visit to Minnesota, if you can easily find people like notsusan there. Maybe it's time Minnesota had a third senator. Sorry, Michigan.
Guess it doesn't take much to get this court to rule something is unconstitutional.
Guess a photo-based app will solve this, until a court decides otherwise.
4
They won't be "elated" for long! The benefit of the chalk is that you can tell if parking enforcement came by. Now, if it's a time stamped photo, or other digital means, you won't have any prior warning until the ticket shows up on your windshield or your mailbox. This lady is going to end up with many more tickets now! Can only shake my head at the logic of all this.
21
OF COURSE this all goes back to an opinion written by Scalia, who else. Your car is not sacred. It is a tool to move you around. This woman was clearly abusing the free short-time parking spaces, intended for use by customers and patrons, not employees like her. Guess what happens next? Saginaw installs hourly pay meters in all of the spots that used to be free, short-time use spots. Congrats.
44
Is taking a picture of a license plate unreasonable search and seizure?
There is a technical fix to this and it could result in much higher revenue.
Instead of marking tires, camera on meter maid vehicles snap picture of the license plate. They drive around again and license plate snaps are matched and tickets are auto generated. A red light flashes on the dash of the meter maid vehicles when they need to stop to place the ticket. Or is touching the car for placement of the ticket now illegal search and seizure.
12
@Djt What about towing? and/or affixing attachments that keep the owner from driving away? Should this seizure of property be made w/o a trial?
This ruling of a 3 panel court is one of the major issues in society today.
How this court made the leap that marking a tire with chalk is equal to an illegal search and seizure is insane, and which is one reason President Trump was elected into office.
29
@MDCooks8 Oh, the old Trump trope. Everything is the fault of Trump these days. President Trump was elected in office because a) The Hillary Clinton camp used despicable tactics to get rid of their main competitor Bernie Sanders, thus infuriating Sanders's supporters b) There are tens of thousands of illegal immigrants pouring into the country, which most American taxpayers are fed up of supporting. Children of illegal immigrants get medical financial support that children of American parents cannot claim, because they do declare revenues and pay taxes.
@MDCooks8
Voting for Trump to "solve that problem' seems misguided.
Similar to replacing a complete car if you have a flat tire.
2
@Ronald Weinstein
Again, please read the letter. Nothing was blamed on Trump. It's just not your day I guess. Been there. Cheers.
When the American Era comes to and end,
I hope some Historian relates this Court Decision
as a sign of the End Times.
Ms. Taylor is a scofflaw and she denies
citizens who seek to use the public service
and shop in nearby stores their right to park.
We have millions who are homeless, cannot get
basic medical care, innocents on death row and
in prison for life and this case is heard, let alone
decided as a violation of the Constitution ?!?
48
@John Brown
Don't forget children in cages
3
14 tickets in 3 years? It sounds like someone should fined a good lot or take a taxi.
42
Bottom line is Ms. Taylor was breaking the law. This ruling just makes it easier excuse personal responsibility which is more and more prevalent in our society today. I hope her town finds another way to identify illegally parked cars and continue the fines.
84
a smartphone photo would work just as well at no additional enforcement cost. everyone has one. it's really that simple.
2
@john Not really. You would have to prove that the time stamp on the phone is accurate. The picture would have to be GPS stamped also. Then come questions of GPS accuracy, etc.. And who's to say that taking a picture of a private vehicle is not an intrusion?
3
please read the article. the chalk being placed on the tire is what makes it a 4th Amendment violation. with a street photo, there's no 4th Amendment issue. the vehicle hasn't been touched. it's all explained in the article.
1
It's possible that “the most prolific issuer of parking tickets” is employed by the City for precisely that purpose; so the implication that it's some sort of renegade cop who takes pleasure in issuing tickets may be misplaced. Secondly, there are two issues here. If the citizens of Saginaw want to have downtown parking spots which are free for short visits in order to assist shoppers and visitors, that's their affair and it should be policed. It seems to me that the mechanics of this policing (chalk mark, video surveillance) is less important than the decision to do so, provided that it does not damage or permanently mark the vehicle. I don't seen any search and seizure distinction between a chalk mark and a video recording.
20
A dubious ruling, as the article points out. Any form of "touching" a car by police is illegal and is a therefore a "search."
The supreme court will revisit it at some point. Saginaw is of course looking at parking meters.
18
@K Henderson
Any form of "touching" is a "search", but not all searches are illegal. The Fourth Amendment only protects people against unreasonable searches and seizures, and only if unreasonable would a search be illegal. The district court and sixth circuit disagreed on the reasonableness of the search.
7
@K Henderson
I'm rather certain the Supreme Court has more pressing matters to take up than this one.
2
United States of America, 2019: placing a chalk mark on a car is an unreasonable search and seizure but requiring women and girls to submit to, take time off work and pay for a non-medically necessary ultrasound of their body before terminating a pregnancy is not. We’ve lost our way.
179
With digital license plates this would not be a issue....they city could track how long a car is parked and attach the bill to the registration fees or tow it , with a e mail notice to the owner....digital license plates have numerous good things/advantages to offer for everyone as not only on a individual level but on a collective playing field as well, the most important being a part of the New vehicle communicating with vehicle which will make the roads safer and lower the 40 thousand deaths due to HUMAN ERROR/ yes self driving cars will Lower that figure to NEAR ZERO!
3
@There for the grace of A.I. goes I
You are too optimistic about self-driving cars.
If some part of the system fails and the owner
cannot afford to pay to fix it...
Likewise Used Cars - parts wear out and
do you trust the Used Car Salesman to know,
let alone tell, you what really needs fixing.
Finally, people do very odd things when they
drive, why presume the engineers who design
the self-driving system have and can take all
those oddities into account ?
2
@John Brown No I am 100 percent right on self driving cars being 100 percent better than the best driver in the World in a mere 8 years tops/ that is the projected date for quantum computing to have true self awareness and all human errors begin to get fixed as a new era.age of reality begins that will make the industrial age look like a baby crawling vs the speed of light.
Cities and towns should be publishing how much money they make from parking tickets. I believe the smallest ticket in Berkeley for parking when the streets are going to be cleaned is $49. Outrageous.
4
@Dr. B
The street-cleaning comment made me laugh. After the Oakland-Berkeley fire the city temporarily stopped sending cleaning trucks around, but the police still appeared to give out tickets. I lived there for years and never got a ticket of any kind. You read the signs, follow the rules, and walk a lot.
4
By the same logic then wouldn’t the government not be able to tag internet traffic and mark IP addresses for surveillance?
Methinks this court is a bit ignorant of the consequences of their actions.
6
Metered pay parking is much more effective for ensuring availability and fairness of access to parking, which are at least two important goals for parking regulation in a commercial district, particularly when rates are adjusted to maintain a reasonable vacancy rate. In other words, sometimes capitalism works to efficiently allocate limited resources.
8
While the parking and speeding fines were not initially created to finance government, many cities and states are using them for that purpose. Republican administrations of city governments in their pursuit of financing government without tax increases have made parking and speeding violations a revenue source.
15
@John I agree. Having a police department that is mostly funded by revenue is problematic.
4
Install meters that require pre-payment. You put your receipt on the dashboard and then there are no arguments about whether you overstayed your visit or not.
It costs money to do that, so chalking is a cheap but unreliable alternative.
In any event, I find someone who has received 14 parking tickets in three years is being obdurate at best.
102
Are people elated because they were truly concerned with the invasion of private property or that they now may have a better chance to break the law and not be caught?
With chalking deemed illegal, will the city now proceed with more invasive, yet legal ways—such as video surveillance—to monitor parking spaces?
65
"Ms. Taylor had gotten 14 parking tickets in three years, all written by the same officer, “the most prolific issuer of parking tickets” for the city of Saginaw, as the complaint puts it."
In some jurisdictions, this kind of aggressive enforcement is better known as "public servants fundraising for their salaries."
14
@Sue
She's parking near her place of employment. She may be there 200+ days a year. I see tickets as controlling a nuisance - people with cars taking up a public space all day long.
33
@Sue
No, it's ensuring parking places aren't abused. Local businesses count on the turnover for revenue. If the same cars take up the spaces for several hours it keeps others from patronizing businesses for lack of a place to park.
Parking abundance is often a big issue in localities.
55
@nom de guerre I would ask whether there is a dedicated lot or special parking permits for employees of stores in the area. We don't know from this article, but when no accommodation is made for employees' parking needs, you have to wonder what the motivations are. Retail employees, especially, shouldn't have to risk a fine that could equal a couple of hours of wages. Not everyone can take the bus or train to work.
1
Parking time limits are not created to "raise revenue", parking time limits are imposed to ensure that a public good is allocated in an efficient manner. Parking limits are created to ensure that citizens attempting to patronize businesses in a business district have a place to park. That this woman has free parking available, but instead choose to hoard a public good by squatting in a parking space all day is just one more example of the selfish deterioration of American society. If this ruling holds up, we can only hope that many other far less reasonable searches will be also made illegal. But, the fact that the chalk is now unconstitutional does not change the fact that Ms. Taylor is a selfish abuser of the public trust.
146
@Lawyer121 In an ideal world, parking time limits would do the work you say, and fines would simply be a deterrent. However, with shrinking municipal budgets, parking rule violations (along with stop light cameras) have become a revenue stream for cash-strapped towns and cities. Additionally, many downtown shopping areas create short-term parking situations without allowances for store employees who then have to clock out to run outside every hour or two to feed a meter illegally, or attempt to find another spot.
We should all make every effort to abide by the law in every sense. However, it defies reality to assert that the only reason fines exist is for deterrence purposes.
15
@Lawyer121 says "parking time limits are imposed to ensure that a public good is allocated in an efficient manner."
If that were truly the case then fines would be 5 bucks not 20 bucks a pop. It is a disingenuous argument.
6
@K Henderson
Not true. If the fine were $5.00 people would pay it as a form of parking lot fees. $20.00 is more imposing and requires a bigger obligation should the driver want to "pay" for parking.
24
Why doesn't the police department patrol the parking lot instead of the metered parking spaces? That would enable them to figure out where the broken glass is coming from, end that problem, and enable the Plaintiff, for example, to use that lot.
Oh, wait. Then the police department couldn't collect all of that parking fine revenue from Plaintiff and other similarly-inconvenienced individuals. So of course they go for the money.
And sure, it is important to look out for business owners... but what, exactly, are the business owners doing to look out for their employees? Oh, right. Nothing.
23
"Chalking" is typically utilized to enforce short (1 - 2 hours)duration use of parking in shopping areas.
Install coin or credit parking meters. Problem solved.
8
@Joe Miksis,
...because meters only collect money, they don't free-up the space for others after two hours.
1
@Joe Miksis
I see you're from my old town, San Francisco. The problem there is the rampant abuse of disabled placards that allow deadbeats to park at meters all day every day.
Walk down any street with meters in SF and you'll see more cars with placards than those without.
1
Good.
Can we now draw a line from chalking cars to chalking social media accounts? The principle is basically the same. The Times' reporting almost two weeks ago on Google sharing maps data with law enforcement is a good example of that. Other examples are Facebook apps developed to cast a wide net for law enforcement.
Police need to re-learn how to do their investigative work, legally and ethically.
---
Things Trump Did While You Weren’t Looking [2019]
https://wp.me/p2KJ3H-3h2
8
Instead of chalking, just take pictures with date, time stamp and license plate #.
19
@Uri Placeable and if the owner moves the car and parks it again in the same spot a half hour later... how exactly does your idea solve anything ?
5