LA Parking Enforcement - I Don’t Like You Guys

I am going to warn you now that today’s post could be a little up there in the length department.

Let me talk first about parking enforcement here in downtown Los Angeles. If these guys ran the city, LA would be the most well run machine in the nation. Parking enforcement officers zoom around in their low emission hybrid cars and hand out tickets like candy here in the core. They are everywhere from 9-5, you couldn’t escape them if you tried!

Do I think you should get a ticket if your meter runs out? Sure. Should you get a ticket, or a boot if you park along a rush hour route during the times you can’t be parked? Absolutely. However, I am not sure about some of the tactics I have witnessed in my short time here; officers standing around and waiting for a meter to hit zero so they can write a ticket, or officers lining up tow trucks minutes before 3 p.m. outside of Ralphs so they can ticket and tow everyone parked illegally when the clock strikes the top of the hour.

The first time we visited LA we found a single spot on Flower street near the building we wanted to check out, but the meter read FAILED. There was a parking enforcement officer on the other side of the street and H asked him what the deal was. He said we could park there if the meter was not working. So we did, and no big deal. Fast forward to late April on a Saturday afternoon when we drove to another part of downtown for lunch and once again found ourselves at a FAILED meter. Again, an officer was around so we asked and received a smart ass answer that a FAILED meter is a FAILED meter. Needing an answer and not a statement we asked if we could park there and were told yes.

Fast forward to yesterday when we took Carter to Pussy & Pooch for a bath. We get near the store and there is one open meter, so we pull in and park. Hop out to notice the meter reads ….. FAILED. Past experience says we can park there, or so I thought. We emerged 45 minutes later to find a $40 ticket on the car and the meter reading 0:00. Did the meter reset itself? Did parking enforcement reset the meter and then give us a ticket?

I was riled up from this point on because I don’t think we should have received the ticket. I came home and searched online but of course there is no information on the web about FAILED meters. I called the number on the ticket and Chamique answered after being on hold for ten minutes. I told her I received a ticket and had a question. She asked for the ticket number and then took my personal information, name and mailing address to be exact. She then told me I had 21 days to contest the ticket. Ummmm okay, how do I do that? I can write in or I can visit an office. I asked my new friend Chamique what the policy is regarding FAILED meters - and of course she said nothing so I asked again in another way, wanting to know whether or not you can park at a FAILED meter. He response was “You can take a chance, but you might receive a ticket.” I thanked Chamique and then tried to figure out her response - so is it a game parking at a FAILED meter? Hit or miss? This wasn’t what two different parking enforcement people told me.

So I walk uptown (don’t need another ticket) in 85 degree weather, get lost along the way and finally find the office I need. I show my ticket and I’m given a form to fill out with my name, address and a statement. How many lines do I get to make my statement? Three. Obviously not much of a statement on my part but I did the best I could with the three lines I was given. I’m told I will hear something within 14-21 days and left.

I know what they are going to say - pay the ticket. It’s going to be my word against some guy that thinks he is a cop but really only has a cool machine that spits out tickets on the spot.

But why can’t anyone give me an answer on what the FAILED meter policy is?

Oh yeah — on my walk from our house to the office I passed directly in front of 31 parking meters. How many of them were FAILED? 20. That’s 65% people - 65% of the meters I passed were not working. Were they all going to get tickets too?

Upon arriving home it got me to thinking, why does parking enforcement work so hard to hand out as many tickets as possible, to boot cars left and right and tow whatever they can? Revenue. Well obviously right, but I think they are making up for other departments. I don’t see a lot of development downtown in terms of new businesses moving in to set up shop, namely big box stores. The revenue from all the new housing developments? Sits in a big fund and goes nowhere while the city banks on the Grand Avenue project that will be completed in 10 years, hoping that will bring a park and a store downtown.

So it’s my contention that parking enforcement does the dirty work and keeps the city running one ticket, one boot and one tow at a time.

Tied Up Doggies

Last night we went for a walk and passed Ralph’s grocery store. It was then we saw a familiar sight when it comes to people’s dogs — owners inside shopping and their puppies tied up outside.

H: “Would you tie up Carter and go inside to shop?”

B: “First, I wouldn’t do that because I love Carter and would hate to come out and find him gone. Second, I paid $600 for Carter, why in the world would I leave him out? You don’t see me going inside to shop and leaving my wallet on the ground do you?”

Carter Thursday/Upcoming Theme Week

Just a short note to let you know I am preparing a theme week, comparing Chicago to Los Angeles after three moving of living here on the west coast. The idea is ‘borrowed’ from some great posts over at The Fake Angeleno.
In the mean time, here is Carter doing what he does best - destroying toys. This thing because as a camel and has now become a hunk of mess. I will give the fluff-ball one thing, he is clever. He finds a strand, wets it with his mouth and then pulls on the single strand to get it loose.

Personal Odds and Ends

Just a few things that have come up lately that you may or may not be interested in …

• We are thinking of switching credit card companies and before applying for a new one I thought we should check our credit report. As much as we should know our current score I just wanted to make sure there were no mistakes on the report itself. We used annualcreditreport.com which allows you one report from each of the three major bureaus, once a year for free. Of course I couldn’t pull up H’s for one reason or another so I filled out a form and sent it off to Equifax (it’s happened before, not worried). However mine came back saying I had close to $750,000 of outstanding debt! They listed our primary mortgage on my report three times, our auto loan three times and our HELCO three times. I called their customer service line and the guy on the other line assured me things were only listed once. When I told him I showed it being listed three times he said I must have made a mistake when I downloaded the information from the website. Excuse me? I made a mistake when I hit the save button? Nice try buddy, and I know your real name isn’t “Andy” either with that thick accent of yours. Anyhow, a new report was sent to me yesterday and everything appears correct. Finally.
• We are listed with a new Realtor, I may have mentioned that. There have been a few visits in the last week and one more today. We can’t do anything except sit back and wait but we would love to have this over and done with.
• Carter got a hair cut on Tuesday. They kind of messed up his head, taking more off than they should have but it was the first time he was there and they didn’t know any better. When he got shaved back in the winter his head had more hair than his body so at least it is evened out now. Overall it’s nice to have him squeaky clean and the hair out of his eyes. I do find that he looks at us more lately, almost as if he forgot what we looked like.
• H’s contact lenses have been bothering her, probably because you are supposed to wear them only for two weeks and she stretches that out into two months (what a trooper!). She called the insurance company and can’t get in to see someone until October as per her health plan. They directed her toward some online companies for an order but they are too expensive and she can’t wait that long. A quick call to her eye doctor back in Chicago and they confirmed she can’t see anyone until October, but did fax her prescription. After we spent $200 on lenses last year we noticed you could buy them at Sam’s Club cheaper so we are heading there this afternoon to see if we can pick up a few. H just called and the person on the other end said they are ‘disbursing lenses from 1-6 pm today’. Hmmmm, that is an interesting way to put it so this could be interesting.
• It’s hot here! I mean 100 degree farenheight hot! This might get old quickly and it better not be like this all summer long. Especially since the central air seems to kicking in every 10 minutes and we can’t afford to be that comfortable.
• Remember when the moving company lost our shelves and damaged our couch? We’ve had the paperwork to submit for more than two months now but I have to get estimates on repairing the couch. Every place I call around here will only reupholster, and they won’t do a repair. The places I have been told to call that may do repairs don’t speak English all that well. So I will either submit the claim forgetting about the couch or just saying it’s damaged and I can’t get estimates and we will have to replace it.
• When we moved in the owner had a palm tree in one corner of the unit. It looked really nice actually, and you see it all the time when you sneak a peek into other people’s units. Well of course the thing was dying and there was no way to save it. It sat dead in the corner for two weeks until the ‘branches’ started drooping down and hitting you when you sat on the couch so we finally threw it out. We plan to replace it with a lamp I think, but do you know how expensive a nice floor lamp is?!?!

Thoughts from Our Evening and Morning Walk

Let’s talk about our morning walk first which involves just Carter and I.

It’s always fun to comment and poke fun at the eclectic, strange and everyday people we encounter during our morning routine. Unfortunately our neighborhood was boring this morning and we didn’t see too many people out and about. Perhaps they were gearing up for the 94 degree weather we are supposed to have today! So here is the less-funny observational commentary on our journey.

Crossed the street to the one strip of grass of significance in our neighborhood. Of course the grass isn’t well maintained and it is slowly turning into a strip of mud but you take what you can here. Carter relieved himself in front of the new cafe under construction. I’m not sure what the patio diners are going to think when every dog in the area is doing their business on the only piece of grass in the area while they are eating their panini but it is what it is. Down the street a little further where he did his other business in a timely fashion. The two new buildings going up on Flower Street are progressing quickly; Carter isn’t a big fan of the noise associated with the days when cement is being poured but who are we to stand in the way of progress. Down Olympic and we didn’t see one fashionable person the entire way which was rather disappointing. The sticker looking for ‘girls’ is still on the pole, I wonder if anyone called. Back around to 9th where Carter likes to stand in front of the air conditioning vents and has the wind blow air all around him.

And that was our boring morning walk.

Our evening walks usually involve H, and lately have turned into an on-going discussion of downtown Los Angeles and the government here. Last night H decided we should get on a committee instead of just complaining to ourselves about everything so we might look into that soon. Here are some random thoughts that have come up about our new home and the development of downtown:

• There is never any news in the paper about the mayor or the city council doing anything to better the city.
• Everyone talks about the redevelopment of downtown and how great it is going to be. Sure they are building LA Live which is fine and all, but I can’t tell you how many new residences are being created. Well, if you want people to move downtown there has to be things for them to do near where they live. There are no decent parks, very few “regular” restaurants, few commercial retailers such as book stores, electronic outlets or anything else. A lot of what we read says those things will come in time, but why would someone drop $600k on a home with no place to take their kids or pets? Back in Chicago, Daley put the onus on the developers to build parks and green space when developing along the water front which is a great idea since it created an instant neighborhood. Here they collect money from the developers and then argue as to how it will be spent.
• They are spinning the decline in new home sales in the downtown core by saying buyers are waiting for developments to be completed before purchasing. I don’t buy it. I think the husband and wife thinking about moving into the core looks around and see a concrete jungle that reeks of urine and begins to question why they want to move here. You can’t go to the Disney Center every night, or LA Live when it opens. There has to be some regular, every day things to do and see.
• It seems little gets done here because everyone and their uncle is part of an advocacy group and wants their interests to be the most important. I think Daley has done a lot of shady things back in Chicago but you can’t deny that he gets the job done. Everyone freaked out when he dug up the airport on the lake, but everyone raves about the park and concert venue he built there. Broadway shows are a hit in the theater district of Chicago, in part because Daley gave them a sweetheart deal in terms of rent knowing it would bring people into the Loop not only to play but to live.

We’re just venting and ranting, and there is more substance to many of our thoughts and we will share them over the next little while.

Carter and Turtle - What a Tuesday

** I know it says Tuesday in the title, and in fact it is Wednesday. I have no idea where Tuesday went **

Carter is heading in for a haircut today, just a little trim and some other grooming needs. After reading a number of reviews we settled on Muttropolitan here in Los Angeles. I called yesterday and made an appointment for Carter, ensuring he didn’t get a morning time because he is incredibly lazy in the a.m.. The person on the other end was a little confused and wanted to know if I had already called to make an appointment. After telling her no she was quite and told me it was strange because they don’t see a lot of Wheatens in her place, but tomorrow she has appointments for three of them. Can you imagine all the jumping, running, licking and barking if they happen to be there at the same time?

One of our favourite shows on television is Entourage and according to blogdowntown they are filming here in Los Angeles today. I have a few things to do this afternoon but I might take a quick run over there to see if anything interesting is taking place.

Mind you, it is supposed to be 91 here today so I don’t know how much outside time I want to spend considering I tend to burn after being outside for 5 minutes or so.