SCHENECTADY Parking ticket advice: Be nice Defendants who are courteous can secure a deal BY KATHLEEN MOORE Gazette Reporter
The city’s entire law department took over a courtroom Friday to deal with 300 drivers insisting on trials for parking tickets. The tickets have been building for a year. To keep them from clogging up City Court, the assistant corporation counsels and even the city’s top attorney spent an entire day listening to excuses and offering deals — sometimes. One driver came in to tell the attorneys that the city was a “fool” to give him a ticket. He was showing a house to a potential buyer, he said. How could the city give him a ticket for illegal parking when he was trying to bring residents to the city? C o r p o r a t i o n Counsel L. John V a n N o r d e n shook his head as one of his assistants listened to the speech. “There’s no exception for Realtors,” he said. “Frankly, I would’ve cut him off the second time he said the city was a fool.” Courtesy went a long way Friday. The law department has the authority to dismiss or reduce any parking ticket — just as the district attorney can choose which criminal cases to prosecute. Yelling at Van Norden got defendants nowhere. Those who threw themselves on the law department’s mercy were far more likely to walk out with a small fine. ....................>>>>..................>>>>................http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....r00101&AppName=1
Giving parking tickets to Sch’dy Realtors is just plain dumb
As a former real estate agent, I read Kathleen Moore’s May 29 article. “Parking ticket advice: Be nice,” with displeasure. There was a part of me that believes this article was a pre-emptive move on the part of Corporation Counsel John Van Norden because he feared one of the “not-nice” parking violators, particularly the real estate agent that he mentioned, was going to go to the press with their plight. Is it not hard enough to sell houses in Schenectady with the high taxes, poorperforming school district, and continuing police scandals? The final straw, parking tickets (which generated a whole $1,500 — probably not enough to pay corporation counsel staff for the day) in residential areas that were given to a real estate agent showing a house in Schenectady, and to his client. I’m sure when they walked out from the showing, he was eager to become one of those overburdened taxpayers. What I am [also] sure of is that agent will be reluctant to sell houses in the city because of public servants like John Van Norden’s smooth public relations ploy. A 2005 study by Sandi Smith showed that as parking ticket revenue rose, downtown sales tax revenue decreased proportionally. So, while this may seem like a nice revenue boost, it’s just another straw that broke the camel’s back in Schenectady.
JOE BUEMI Naples, Florida The writer is a former Schenectady resident.
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