City Booting More Cars, Writing Fewer Tickets

By Chuck Sudo in News on Oct 19, 2010 2:30PM

To those who've received a parking ticket recently it may now seem as though the city is writing more, but that's exactly what's happening.

According to records released yesterday during City Council budget hearings, the number of parking tickets issued declined during the first eight months of 2K10 over the same time frame last year. A total of 1.66 million tickets have been issued so far. The primary reason cited for the decline is a higher priority by the Police Department on fighting crime.

But when one door closes, another opens. The same records show the number of Denver bootings has increased by 7 percent. Through the end of August, 44,581 boots have been applied to cars across the city. Revenue Department head Bea Reyna Hickey, who was suspended earlier this year when a memo was leaked demanding that more parking tickets be issued, cited Mayor Daley's reduction of the threshold for booting last year from three unpaid tickets to two unpaid, but older than one year.

This is yet another reason why we ride a bike. Just sayin'.