A brief history, and a plan to make things right
When I was New York City’s traffic commissioner in the 1980s, I once received a frantic call from the U.S. State Department’s liaison to the United Nations. He was fearful of the repercussions of my plan to remove parking spaces from diplomats and tow their illegally parked vehicles.
My actions sparked one of the best-attended meetings of the Secretariat. Countries were united against my plan. I was told, repeatedly, how I was in violation of the Geneva and Vienna agreements. To the consternation of the State Department, I did not back down. In the end, I was told our diplomats lost parking spaces in Oslo and Togo. To me, the price was worth it.
Towing diplomats’ cars was a no-brainer in New York City; no one had sympathy for them. But when I started to tow my brethren from government agencies and the press, the squawking was palpable. Everyone rightly upset about parking impunity by the NYPD and other agencies, about placard abuse and ghost plates and all the rest, should take note — and double down in fighting the scourge.
When I told Mayor Ed Koch I planned to reduce press parking spaces and tow them, he characteristically remarked, “Take ‘em all away, who gives a shit about the press?” One of my greatest memories as commissioner came during an interview by the surly, gritty, everyman New Yorker Milton Lewis of WABC TV. He asked, would I tow “even an Eyewitness News Truck?” I said, “Watch,” and then I gave the thumbs-up to a nearby traffic agent, and a tow truck hauled it away. Milt, knowing a great story was unfolding, had his cameraperson aim at the truck as it disappeared into the sunset.
Towing diplomats’ cars was a no-brainer in New York City; no one had sympathy for them. But when I started to tow my brethren from government agencies and the press, the squawking was palpable.
Next on my agenda was illegal parking by cars bearing police placards — a subject that’s rightly getting lots of people upset today, as cops rampantly block sidewalks and bike lanes and generally put their vehicles where they please.
Enforcement against such rule-breaking doesn’t have to be lame. The Traffic Department grew out of the New York Police Department around 1950. In 1973, an NYPD deputy commissioner, Benjamin Ward, became traffic commissioner. I was an engineer in the department and quickly became his right-hand guy. One of his goals was to take traffic enforcement out of the police department, changing the title of meter maids to traffic agents and broadening their authority to write all parking violations and subsequently moving violations. A decade later, Ward was the city’s first Black police commissioner, and I was the traffic commissioner. Ben gave me the backing I needed to start enforcing parking rules for cars bearing law enforcement placards.
One day, my agents towed a Drug Enforcement Administration car and I received a call from an assistant to U.S. Attorney Rudy Giuliani saying I’d face arrest if I didn’t stop. Not only did Ward say, “If they threaten you, we’ll take them out,” but Rudy himself agreed to work with us. So, we developed a plan that the police brass at all levels could live with.
First was unifying the placards into just three types: law enforcement, other government agencies and press. NYPD would self-enforce the block their precinct was on, and any spillover to another street was fair game for ticketing and towing by my agents.
It worked; they did a good job protecting their own blocks from phonies, and bogus placards sharply diminished. If cars with police placards parked illegally outside their precinct block, they were at risk of tickets and tows.
All this fell apart once Ed Koch wasn't reelected; parking placards once again became a goodie officials could offer to their pals.
Fast forward to 2023, and we have a much bigger problem on our streets. There is little enforcement of cars with free-parking placards, which number an estimated 140,000, in no small part because traffic agents are now part of the NYPD, thanks to Giuliani.
Meanwhile, since the advent of photo enforcement, which aims to collect tolls by taking a snapshot of license plates, plate fraud has accelerated exponentially.
For example, until mid-2019, the percentage of right-light camera captures in NYC that were rejected due to temporary plates, no plates or unreadable/marred plates hovered about 1%; by 2022 it reached 7%. Why doesn’t this upset people every bit as much, if not more, than subway farebeating?
The problem with faux plates, permits and illegal parking by those sworn to enforce the law is arguably not out of hand yet, but it’s getting there. With swift and sure action, it can and should be solved.
How high can it go? The Toronto Star recently reported that almost 18% of camera violations in that city had to be thrown out because of unreadable/defaced plates. Can New York be far behind?
In 2019, $3.8 billion was collected at the city’s 15 tolled crossings. Another $20 million was collected by red light and speed cameras. Doing the math on the 7% rejected, the loss equals $264 million/year. If the rate rises to 10%, it’ll be $378 million; at 20%, it’ll be three-quarters of a billion.
Congestion pricing is targeted to collect about $1.3 billion per year to yield a net of $1 billion annually. If plate shenanigans continue or worsen, we’re looking at annual losses of $91 million (at 7%) to $260 million (at 20%). Since that money is to be bonded, the loss in capital dollars, at a 15:1 ratio, could approach $4 billion.
To make matters worse, we now have an epidemic of “ghost plates.” A mindboggling and stellar three-part series by Streetsblog’s investigative reporter Jesse Coburn revealed the widespread and growing fraud by “dealers” issuing bogus plates. Coburn explains how easy it is to get temporary plates from states like New Jersey, Texas and Georgia; many are simply paper. Police in Nassau County say 30% of vehicles stopped with these plates have had weapons and/or drugs.
Go back to basics and recognize only three types of parking permits, as we did under Koch: law enforcement, other government agencies and press.
The problem with faux plates, permits and illegal parking by those sworn to enforce the law is arguably not out of hand yet, but it’s getting there. With swift and sure action, it can and should be solved. The dividends to the city will be in the hundreds of millions of dollars, and in the case of congestion pricing, where money is bonded, in the billions.
Here’s the fix:
First, go back to basics and recognize only three types of parking permits, as we did under Koch: law enforcement, other government agencies and press. Require representatives from NYPD, DOT and City Hall to unanimously agree on all permit applications. Share recipient info with the IRS.
Second, assign 100 selected enforcement officers and 10 tow-truck drivers to either DOT or the Department of Investigation. (My preference would be to return parking enforcement to DOT.) Appoint a czar of placard parking who has the backbone to ticket fellow government workers. Adopt a summons-first, adjudicate-later policy.
Third, form a multi-agency task force from law enforcement, transportation agencies and DMVs in the metropolitan area to combat the “ghost-plates.” Create reciprocity with neighboring states, which is integral. Governors should work together.
Fourth, traffic agents should patrol looking for mismatched plates and registration stickers, defaced or marred plates and other irregularities. They don’t do this enough now.
Fifth, sample vehicles that are parked on-street and in public garages to ascertain how big a problem this is and identify trends. This would include recording out-of-state license plates and looking for cars that repeatedly park in New York City overnight.
This is not an intractable problem. It can be solved if leaders, from the mayor to county executives to governors, are genuinely on board and commit resources to boot. Done right, these measures will generate revenue and make us safer. Who could ask for more?