[Peace-discuss] Fwd: Parking: can you post.?

[Alfred Kagan]

FYI, posting for Susan.

>X-Sender: sgdavis:alexia.lis.uiuc.edu at 127.0.0.1
>Date: Thu, 29 Jul 2004 13:20:35 -0500
>To: Al Kagan <akagan at uiuc.edu>
>From: Susan Davis <sgdavis at uiuc.edu>
>Subject: Parking: can you post.?
>
>Memo to the aware group.  Concerning parking and towing.  From Susan Davis.
>
>I know that people have had concerns about parking, and being towed 
>during our prospect for peace demonstrations.  At the groups request 
>I reviewed the city code, section 33, to understand better the city 
>rules about parking on private and public property.
>
>Our problems have largely been with Lowe's and tires plus.  I have 
>not been every demonstration, but apparently Lowe's objects to our 
>parking in their lot if we are demonstrators, and so does Tires Plus 
>apparently both stores have had prospect for peace demonstrators 
>towed on occasion. at one point I had two loan a friend $40 so that 
>his car would not be towed I don't know how many other people I've 
>had this experience or similar one..
>
>The following rules about parking apply or appear to apply on 
>properties like Lowe's and tires plus.
>
>If the property is private, the owner or the owners representative 
>may have a car towed under the following conditions (not including 
>cars labeled handicapped).
>And not including cars blocking fire lanes.:
>
>One. the property must be private property, and The private property 
>must be well posted.  This means that there must be "a sign 
>prominently placed at each driveway access or curb cut allowing 
>vehicle access to the property within 5 ft. from the public 
>right-of-way line.... the sign must be posted not less than one sign 
>each 100 ft. of the lot frontage."  The sign must be posted not less 
>than 24 hours prior to the towing or removing of any vehicle.  There 
>must be a written notice on the sign including the name address and 
>current telephone number of the relocator (people who tow away your 
>car and store it) used by the property under.  So property must be 
>well and clearly and timely posted. This especially is intended to 
>apply to commercial properties.  We need to check and see if both 
>Tires Plus and lows are properly posted.  My guess is they are.
>
>Two: there must be a contract filed with the city between the towing 
>service and the property owner.  The property owner can't just call 
>up any old towing service.  Seven days must have passed before 
>commencing towing. The read locator must be licensed by the city to 
>perform such work. (This is too discourage freelance and pirate 
>towing services, I guess.)
>
>Three prior to the removal of trespassing vehicles, the Police 
>Department must be notified by the property owner that the property 
>owner intends to have the vehicle code, and the required " police 
>tow authorization forms" must be filled out.  This is in article 
>three, section 33-168: towing regulations, item number nine..  And 
>it's a little bit mysterious, because it sounds as if the property 
>owner has to file a form before he calls a tow truck operator. No 
>pre-signed forms may be used, and the forms are official, supplied 
>by the city clerk to the towing service.  They have to be properly 
>signed and dated. The exception to this as if the police order your 
>car towed. If this is the case, spontaneous retaliatory towing might 
>be subject to city scrutiny.
>
>Four: it's unlawful for any tow operators to take kickbacks.
>
>Five: only a proper representative of the property owner can request a tow.
>
>Six.  It's unlawful to remove a vehicle if the owner or the operator 
>of the vehicle is present or arrives at the vehicle location any 
>time prior to the completion of removal and is willing and able to 
>remove the vehicle immediately.  In other words, if you show up and 
>say wait, I will move the car, it is unlawful for them to tow you. 
>EXCEPT if they have already hooked you up to the tow truck.  If that 
>is the case the tow Company may charge you a see, commonly called a 
>hookup fee, which shall not be more than one half the posted rate of 
>the towing fee, and our receipt shall be given for this.
>
>Seven.  The Police Department has to be notified within 30 minutes 
>following the removal of a vehicle, with all vehicle information and 
>location information.  If the tow operator doesn't do this, they are 
>in trouble.  They must also final relocation forms within seven days 
>of the removal.  This together is a way of keeping track of People's 
>property in the form of automobiles.
>
>Further, one can protest a relocation of 14 days after the date of 
>towing, or within five days of receipt of the notice that the 
>vehicle has been removed and is being stored at the towing service. 
>All re-locator tows are subject to review, within these time frames. 
>Cases where the vehicle owner raises a question about charges on a 
>bill from a towing service can be raised with the Chief of police. 
>No ripoffs allowed.  Towers have to abide by all these rules, and 
>there has to be probable cause that the vehicle towed was actually 
>in some kind of violation.  In other words, we can hassle them.
>
>All this is a long way of saying that we should check into whether 
>these two businesses have the right to threaten to tow our cars, 
>and, if they do to our cars, whether they are doing so properly and 
>legally.  If they are not doing so properly, we argue with them. 
>The tow operator can lose its license if it has enough complaints 
>filed against it.
>
>
>There's another interesting point we will have to look into: are 
>these parking lots truly private property?  If they have been built 
>with the city support, city funding, city's sub invention or city 
>tax breaks it might be arguable that they are actually at least 
>partly public property, and and therefore open to our use as long as 
>our use is reasonable.  (E.g. no nude demonstrations or large 
>bonfires, just parking unfortunately).
>
>One way to use this information is to check into whether towing in 
>the past has been legal or on the borderline of legal.  If it has 
>not been, there's nothing we can do about it now, that we can inform 
>tires plus and lows that we know the towing ordinance and what it 
>does and does not allow them to do.  I need to go over to the 
>parking lots and look for the postings.
>
>Another way to use this information is as the background to talking 
>with Tires Plus and Lowe's to see if we can work something out.  My 
>guess is they object so much to having antiwar protesters on the 
>fringes of their property because in the case of tires plus they 
>don't like our politics, and in the case of lows, I don't know, but 
>I would suspect they don't want anything that might distract people 
>from coming there to shop.  If they are even in fuzzy violation of 
>the law, or just not quite inside it, we could argue that bad press 
>might not be worth lost customers.  We could try to make sure no one 
>parks in places that really bothered their businesses, if they would 
>lay off hassling us with towing services.
>
>I don't know how much time anybody wants to spend on this --- it's 
>always a balance of what to spend your energy on.  I do think the 
>suggestion that we find a more remote parking space is impracticable 
>(?)  And would discourage people from coming easily to our dropping 
>into the demonstration.  We might just want to find a business that 
>doesn't particularly care if we park on the edge of their parking 
>area.
>At 08:55 PM 7/25/2004 -0500, you wrote:
>>Susan,
>>
>>Can you get me the Johnson quotes and citation?
>>--
>>
>>
>>Al Kagan
>>African Studies Bibliographer and Professor of Library Administration
>>Africana Unit, Room 328
>>University of Illinois Library
>>1408 W. Gregory Drive
>>Urbana, IL 61801, USA
>>
>>tel. 217-333-6519
>>fax. 217-333-2214
>>e-mail. akagan at uiuc.edu


-- 


Al Kagan
African Studies Bibliographer and Professor of Library Administration
Africana Unit, Room 328
University of Illinois Library
1408 W. Gregory Drive
Urbana, IL 61801, USA

tel. 217-333-6519
fax. 217-333-2214
e-mail. akagan at uiuc.edu