Why Should Delaware Care?
Wilmington’s ticketing and towing reforms respond to issues raised in a federal lawsuit, including concerns about fairness and due process. The changes aim to make the system more manageable for residents, but advocates believe additional steps are needed to address the system’s inequities and inaccessibility.
Four months have passed since a federal lawsuit against Wilmington’s ticketing and towing practices was settled, sparking new reforms aimed at transparency and fairness.
The city recently passed legislation and amended its code for collecting outstanding debts, giving the city greater flexibility for payment arrangements, retrieving one’s car after it is towed, and establishing clearer processes for handling disputes.
But some advocates feel there is more work to be done.
As a part of the suit’s settlement agreement, which was released in June, amendments to the procedures for towing and impounding were to be made.
The agreement also requested a six-month adjournment of the trial and pretrial dates to finalize the deal and enact necessary legislation, with a fallback trial date if amendments were not approved.
What’s changed?
This past September, city council passed an ordinance to reform the collection process of parking fines.
The legislation, which was sponsored by at-large Councilwoman Maria Cabrera, allows the city’s finance director to be more flexible with payment plans by removing the previous three-month limit that vehicle owners had to pay their fines.
The code for collections has been updated to allow vehicle owners 12 to 24 months to pay off ticket debt through a payment plan, with extensions possible in special cases at the finance director’s discretion.
Vehicle owners can now also be up to 90 days late on a scheduled payment without penalty.
The ordinance also enables owners to recover their impounded or booted vehicles after entering a payment plan and cancels out any outstanding fees if a towing or storage contractor receives ownership of the impounded vehicle.
Lastly, it designates a hearing officer to handle disputes related to vehicle immobilization and towing, who will follow the procedures set by the Department of Finance.
Cabrera said the city’s towing and ticketing system has come a long way, but that there will always be room for improvement.
The provisions of the ordinance have been written into the finance department’s code for collections, in addition to other amendments that aim to promote debt compliance and more assistance for those who have financial difficulties.
These changes follow the resolution of the 2021 federal case against Wilmington, settled in June, which revealed the fines system’s fundamental flaws, including a lack of adequate due process and the charging of excessively disproportionate fines.
The origin story
In the 2021 federal suit, the Institute for Justice, a national nonprofit public interest law firm, represented Ameera Shaheed and Earl Dickerson, two city locals who had their cars towed and scrapped.
The issue highlighted flaws in Wilmington’s long-criticized ticketing and towing system, forcing the city to take a look at its procedures.
In 2019, Shaheed received multiple parking tickets while parked legally near her home. Despite appealing the tickets, her car was towed and she was ordered to pay $320 for its release, which she could not afford.
After 30 days, First State Towing scrapped her car, profiting from its value of over $4,000 and Shaheed was never compensated for the value of her car nor was her ticket debt ever removed by the city.
As a result of her still owing the city, Shaheed could not own another car even if she had the money, without risking another tow and impound.
In 2021, Dickerson’s car was towed by City Towing after he left it in its parking spot too long, which resulted in a $60 ticket. After paying the ticket and trying to retrieve his car, the towing company demanded an additional $910 to compensate for its holding of the vehicle, which he could not afford as he was on a fixed income.
As a result, his car was scrapped, and the proceeds were kept by the company despite its value being significantly higher than the amount he owed.
A flawed system
Between the end of 2018 and 2021, Wilmington established contracts, first with First State Towing and then with City Towing, to handle the city’s towing and impounding process.
Each company that wanted to secure those contracts had to bid for it. First State won its bid by offering no-cost towing and a $10 per day storage fee, while City Towing essentially offered its services and storage for free.
Essentially, Wilmington did not have to pay for these contracts, and the towing companies were instead authorized to cover costs by keeping, scrapping, and selling the cars they impounded if the vehicle was not reclaimed in 30 days. The towing company would also keep all the proceeds from each car they kept, without crediting the owners’ ticket debt or returning any extra value of the vehicle.
The original complaint cited that City Towing had disposed of at least 987 out of the 2,551 cars it towed in 2020. Meanwhile, the city benefited from a cost-free impound system and the outstanding debt collections.
In April, the city put a new contract into effect with City Towing again, which is charging a $110 tow fee and a $40 daily storage fee, which would give less incentive for the company to scrap cars.
However, towing and storage fees are excluded from the payment plan and must be paid separately.
Although the changes add remedy to the issues exposed in the lawsuit, advocates say that there is more to be done.
More to be done
Ken Grant, a longtime local advocate and critic of the city’s parking enforcement system, said he has encountered many residents who owe tickets they weren’t aware of, in addition to seeing many incidents in which the cars are towed and immobilized, even after an appeal.
“I’m not optimistic that the outcome of this lawsuit is going to make anything other than cosmetic changes,” he said.
According to the city’s Office of Parking Enforcement, notices for parking and redlight tickets are provided to vehicle owners by mail and that state law requires residents to notify the DMV of an address change within 30 days of the change.
“Unfortunately, if a vehicle owner fails to notify DMV of a change of address, they may not receive the notice of violation mailed by the City because the notice would have been sent to the vehicle owner’s prior address,” said city officials.
Mereyum Dede and Shyanne Miller, two members of the Fines and Fees Justice Team, a collaboration of city locals and organizations looking into a variety of city fines and fees, including parking and towing, to make the city more accessible and affordable, also feel that the system needs to be more equitable.
In 2022, the city created a task force to look at fines and fees across the city to determine their impact on the city’s finances and residents, and to come up with recommendations for improvements.
The task force, which was composed of members of city council, representatives from different civic associations and advocates like Miller, was disbanded after they submitted their report this March.
The report, which looked at fines and fees between 2018 and 2022, found that the city, which has a population of a little over 71,000, issues between 80,000 and 100,000 parking and red light tickets per year.
About 85,000 of those more than 450,000 tickets that have been issued had not been paid.
Dede said that most times people don’t pay for their tickets because they can’t afford them.
“We are a city that has a pretty substantial population that’s very low-income, and we’re a majority Black city. And It’s extracting wealth from us, from our communities, in a way that isn’t equitable ” she said.
Between 2018 and 2022, the city issued $42 million in parking and red light tickets, but only $28 million was paid. Of that sum, $13 million went to Conduent, a New Jersey-based company that manages the city’s parking and red light ticketing operations.
Of the sum recouped by the city, $8 million covered parking division expenses, leaving a $7 million net income for the city, according to the report.
The task force recommended that the city stop booting and towing cars to collect payment for parking and red light tickets and to stop enforcing penalties for people who aren’t paying because of limited income.
“Let’s make sure we’re talking about having effective and efficient parking options and solutions, but we should not be talking about this as a revenue raiser, and we have not gotten confirmation from the city that that’s what’s up,” Miller said.
Dede believes the city should end towing practices altogether, which has been done in San Francisco and the state of Minnesota.
But despite her concerns, Dede is optimistic because of an ordinance that was passed in June, which authorizes the city to hire an expert to conduct a study on Wilmington’s parking needs.
At-large Councilman James Spadola, who sponsored the ordinance, said the project is in its beginning stages as the city is still in search of a consultant, but he’s hoping it will take off next year under the new Carney administration.
“If the administration does that study and does it in a positive way, that could be huge,” Dede said.
The mayor’s office said that the administration — which has just weeks left in office before Mayor-elect John Carney takes the held — is not aware of any additional code amendments related to parking enforcement and is not proposing anything further at this time.
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