I forget, are meter maids employed by the police department or the IRS?

Ah... what's the difference?

FFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUU

There's a new sheriff in town.

Well, soon.

And a new city attorney and a new mayor.

Like cars? Good, get used to paying for them if you park them where they're not supposed to be.

Now what I really want to know is, are there any fines you can get for bikes? Cause if Seattle is changing from the first - or second - most biking city to an even higher percentage, we're going to have to adapt our behaviors.

For example, what happens when I chain my bike across the gate to the light rail station? Is that ok?

Let's have names of council members that voted for more goddamned parking blood suckers. They should all get a foot in their ass when next up for re-election. A cynical and extremely irritating means of increasing revenue. And yeah you think nitpicking about parking regulations is pro-bike consider that the bastards in my neighborhood are out there chalking my car every day so they can slap a ticket on it for being parked in one place for 3 days - because I was riding my bike!

@6 - uh, that's been a law in our state since ... god, man, at least the Expo here.

Your right to park ends at your property line (unless you drip oil and leave it in the yard, but let's not go there).

@7 Hmm well as we know there is a law against pretty much everything. Somehow there wasn't exactly an imperative to enforce this particular law until Nichols sent the parking parasites into the neighborhoods in force.

But consider this while gazing imperiously down from the moral high ground: it would be interesting to see stats but I will wager you anything that parking fines are about the most regressive form of taxation going. Guess who piles them up and neglects to pay until they are facing obscenely extortionate late fees - almost certainly the same demographic that subsidizes credit cards for the well-off: those with the least handle on financial matters who are almost always poor.

Then take the bus.

Only idiots drive downtown between 7am-6pm- unless you are paid by the minute, not the mile. Take the fucking bus. One can gluide through the tunnel in ten minutes, no matter the traffic upabove. If you need a car that badly, move it every three days.

@10 that may well have been correct before Nickel's dispatched the parking cretins into the neighborhoods. Common practice since is to bestow one chalk mark per day until it adds up to 3, residential parking permit or no, at least in my neighborhood, and no my neighborhood is not downtown.

@8 -- Not a bad point. But still not regressive in the way sales taxes are. A lower-income person can choose not to own a car, or to be exceedingly careful about how they park one. But they can't choose not to be gouged with a 10% tax on toothpaste, toilet paper, and clothes for their children (many states complete exempt non-luxury clothing from sales tax) so that Microsoft employees don't have to pay any income tax.

@15

no, in fact, an income tax is much more progressive because everyone is taxed the same precent on their overall income, not based on things that they need, not choose to buy. in less you think that toothpaste and clothes (even second hand clothes get taxed) are a luxury.

and lastly, as someone who gets parking tickets on a regular basis, i will gladly pay the four dollars more if it is going towards keeping these awesome programs going. four dollars is nothing in the long run, and these programs are everything to some people right now.

@15 Income taxes are progressively tied to income, duh.

If more parking tickets equals more library hours, hike them up and issue more of them. Out in my 'hood without sidewalks, we never see cars get ticketed, ever. It usually takes a few months for the junk cars to get orange tagged. It usually takes several repeat orange tags before a car actually gets towed away. Send some parking enforcement out here, so we can get better libraries.