Google Group for Somerville Parking Woes

[davidfic.livejournal.com]

Hi all,

I recently became acquainted with the wonderful world of the Somerville Parking and Traffic office.
I have lived in Somerville for about 6 or 7 years and have received the occasional ticket, but recently we had to challenge one of these tickets and that is when I realized what a crazy system they run.

The Ticket Officers seem to wield unchallenged power such that any ticket they write is just about impossible to challenge.

I have created a Google group in the hopes that we can all get together and share our stories, comment on other stories and HOPEFULLY work towards showing the city of Somerville that its citizens won't stand for a department that almost seems above the law.

The URL is:

http://groups.google.com/group/somerville-parking-problems

I am excited to see if we can get a ground swell of support and show the mayor just how many people view this department with disdain.

Regards,

David
 

Comments

[davidfic.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the advise about talking with my alderman about getting an ordinance passed. I will look into.

The reason I created the Google group was that I wanted a place that was a clearing house of all things related to Somerville Parking. While this site is a great resource for all of us living in the Davis Square area, there are many other topics covered. My goal was to have the group gather as many stories in one place as possible. That way the people that feel the strongest about the ticketing problems have a separate place to voice their opinions. Hopefully the site can generate enough discussion among us that we can do things like get the ordinance passed, or put something on a ballet.

My main goal is just to show the city that some of their ticketing laws aren't logical and that there is abuse in the system. How ever that happens, whether it be via this site or on the group site I really don't care. I am just so upset after getting my first glimpse into the inner workings of the city I felt I had to do something :)

There seems to be a lot of people out there that have similar issues with the traffic department. They can't ignore us all :)

[barry-rafkind.livejournal.com]

I agree with xuth that getting the Board of Aldermen to change the parking regulations is probably the most effective solution.

I'm interested to hear whether/how Alderman Trane responds. How did Rep. Sciortino respond?

Unfortunately, Somerville does not have a ballot initiative process. You can petition the BOA to vote on something, but that's much less powerful, since they aren't likely to approve it if they weren't willing to take up the measure on their own in the first place. You can also petition the BOA to hold a public hearing on something, and that could be very effective in drawing attention to an issue.

I think creating the parking-focused Google group is a smart idea. Davis Square LJ does cover many city-wide topics, but mainly from the perspective of people in this area, so it's not very representative of the entire city. The lack of a city-wide forum was the reason why I helped launch the Somerville Voices (http://www.SomervilleVoices.org) blog and why the SomervilleMass (http://community.livejournal.com/somervillemass/) LJ group was created (which I played no part in).

Oh, and parking tickets aren't the only type of citations causing headaches around the city. As reported on in From A Concerned Property Owner (http://www.somervillevoices.org/2008/12/02/politics/from-a-concerned-property-owner/) the city is apparently targeting some property owners with various types of citations that are also next to impossible to dispute. Clearly, this problem goes beyond just the Traffic and Parking department.