Beginning December 3rd, 2018, New York City is raising the discounted fines for certain NYC parking tickets issued to companies enrolled in the stipulated fine and commercial abatement programs. These programs are a trade off between the city and commercial fleets. For not contesting parking tickets, New York City gave the companies a discount on certain violations (those usually beatable with proof). The thinking is that it saves both he city and the companies the time and the cost of live hearings on every single ticket. Of course, this is a tacit acknowledgment that the city has failed to provide adequate parking spaces for commercial deliveries and service calls. Let’s be clear it is not discounted fines that are causing traffic and congestion, the causes are, the city’s removal of traffic and parking lanes, overdevelopment, and increased construction while simultaneously failing to adapt to the growing demand caused by ecommerce.
This is not to say that the program does not need some changes. For example, blocking a fire hydrant should never have been given a discount, which is eliminated under the changes. There are seventeen violations that have zero penalties which are now going to have a discounted fine and ten violations which will no longer have a discounted fine. the full breakdown of the new payment schedule is below.
The most egregious of these changes is charging companies $35 for double parking which is completely legal for commercial vehicles expeditiously making deliveries or service calls outside of Midtown Manhattan.Why on earth should a company pay a dime to the city for a ticket that ought to be dismissed?! There are an estimated 2,700 companies enrolled in the stipulated fine and commercial abatement programs who made a deal with the city in good faith who will now have their costs increase by about 25%.
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