Vancouver police need public tips to catch parking-meter vandals
Credit to Author: Nick Eagland| Date: Thu, 14 Nov 2019 01:37:32 +0000
Parking meter vandalism in Vancouver is on the rise and police say they need the public’s help to bust offenders in the act.
On any day more than 500 of the city’s 11,500 meters are out of order, mostly because of vandalism. Police say they are trying to stop repeat offenders from fishing coins from meters and jamming the devices but must witness them doing so for charges to stick, so they often rely on tips from the public to catch them.
The city is cagey about sharing too much information about the issue. Years ago, news coverage that revealed a bit too much about stealing coins led to a sharp uptick in busted meters in Vancouver as well as neighbouring municipalities whose governments weren’t too thrilled, said Taryn Scollard, Vancouver’s director of streets.
But parking meter vandalism has contributed to a 10 per cent increase in out-of-order meters between 2018 and 2019, so Vancouver is “taking steps to fight the upward trend,” the city said in an emailed statement.
“We totally understand the frustration when people go up and try to use coins in jammed meters, which is why we do service them within 24 hours,” Scollard said.
She said the increase in out-of-order meters is in part due to an increased number of meters installed on sidewalks in recent years (there were 11,200 in 2018, up from 10,100 in 2014).
At any given time, more than five per cent of meters are out of order, so the city is working closely with police, businesses and community organizations to bring that number closer to zero, Scollard said.
“If any of my parking enforcement or meter technician team — or even myself or the managers — are out and we see somebody that looks like they’re vandalizing a parking meter, we call 911,” she said.
Sgt. Steve Addison, a spokesman for the Vancouver police, said parking meter vandalism is a daily occurrence.
Addison said trying to quantify theft from meters is difficult but said it is most prevalent downtown and in Gastown, where there are higher concentrations of meters. Often, it is done by repeat offenders who rely on crimes of opportunity to get cash for food or drugs, he said.
“If you’re jamming a number of meters and pulling out loonies and toonies, it’s a significant amount of money that’s being stolen from the city and stolen from people who are legitimately trying to pay for parking,” Addison said.
“On top of that, you think of what happens if somebody thinks they’ve fed the meter and they haven’t, and a bylaw officer comes along and gives them a ticket. It compounds the pain and now a driver has been ticketed when they honestly thought that they were feeding a meter.”
According to the city’s parking meter bylaw, drivers will get a ticket if they park in a space with a broken meter, particularly if it shows a red or yellow disk or signal flag, or displays four flashing zeros or “OUT OF ORDER.”
The city asks people to report busted meters online or on the VanConnect app, and provide the six-character tracking ID on its side. If someone loses money in a broken meter, the city will give them a parking credit up to $2. Scollard said in some cases the city may reverse a ticket given to a driver who parked at a broken meter.
Addison said police often get calls from business owners watching a person vandalize multiple meters in a short period of time.
“It is a simple crime for us to investigate and prove if we’re able to see it happen, which is why we need people to let us know that it’s happening,” he said.
“If we have information that there’s a man or woman walking around and it looks like they are jamming meters or fishing coins out of meters, we’ll just covertly watch them. I’ve done it dozens of times myself.”
Charges can include theft for stealing a coin, mischief for vandalizing the meter, possession of break-in instruments and, in many cases involving repeat offenders, violating a court order.
In 2018, the city collected $56 million from payment at meters and meter-hooding fees. Scollard said close to 60 per cent of payments now come from the PayByPhone app, which processes payment whether or not a meter is functioning.
Meter maintenance staff work every day to clean the devices, change their batteries, update their software and calibrate them for new coin series.
But theft from meters is a persistent, evolving issue, Scollard lamented.
“People continue to come up with new and interesting ways (to steal from meters) — like everywhere else,” she said.
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