Meter may run out on Everett’s cheap parking fines

Published 12:13 pm Wednesday, June 3, 2009

EVERETT — Christine Floe walked into Everett Municipal Court on Tuesday with a $5 check to pay a $20 parking ticket.

It wasn’t a mistake.

Floe, who works at a downtown auto business, was taking advantage of a popular city program that gives people a break if they pay their parking fines early.

“If you read the ticket, you should know,” said Floe, 26.

Parking tickets paid within 24 hours are reduced by 75 percent. The fines are cut in half if paid within 15 days. The discount is good up to three times per car in a 365-day period.

The issue will be brought before the Everett City Council tonight. A vote is planned at the council’s meeting next week.*

The same proposed ordinance also calls for stiffening fines for repeat offenders who accrue more than three tickets in a year’s time. It ramps up fines even more for people who get six or more tickets.

The move follows a key recommendation in a study of downtown parking that was completed last summer.

The $100,000 study by Barney &Worth Inc. of Portland, Ore., provided a list of recommendations to help the city come up with a strategy to drive downtown office workers to park in garages or back streets to free up spaces on the street meant for customers of downtown shops.

The study said hundreds of people flout downtown parking rules in part because they know that parking fines can be cheaper than paying for off-street parking.

“It’s almost an incentive to violate the time limits,” City Councilman Drew Nielsen said.

Betty Marlin got a parking ticket on Tuesday for parking too long at a city parking space.

The 56-year-old nurse who works at the Snohomish County Jail carried a handicap placard along with the ticket up to the front counter at Municipal Court, where she was informed that she could dispute the ticket or pay $5.

Marlin, who sometimes struggles to walk, said she doesn’t want to pay as much as $90 to park in the county’s parking garage. She prefers free street parking.

“I think it stinks,” she said of the proposal to nix the city’s parking fine reduction program.

The city doesn’t keep tabs on the number of people who have their fines reduced through the program, said court administrator Jeri Cusimano.

Still, there are plenty of “frequent fliers” familiar with the routine who stroll up to the counter with their tickets and a $5 bill in hand, she said.

Chelsea Dowdell, 16, a sophomore at Everett High School, is among that group.

A fellow student in her leadership class told her about the fine reduction program earlier this year. So far, she has had two tickets discounted.

If the city stops discounting fines, she said it might be enough to get her to change her behavior.

The city is expecting to issue about 27,000 parking tickets and to collect about $400,000 in parking ticket revenue this year.

The change in the ordinance is expected to increase how much the city makes on parking tickets initially, but the revenue will likely level off once people learn about it, said Debra Bryant, Everett’s chief administrative officer,

“We’re walking into unknown territory,” she said.

Reporter David Chircop: 425-339-3429 or dchircop@heraldnet.com.

*Correction, June 3, 2009: Because of incorrect information published by the city of Everett, this story incorrectly stated when the council would make a decision.