Give me my money back

July 31, 2009 7:10 AM

I just got my car from the impound, but I want to figure out a way to get my money back from the city (Jersey City,NJ). I don't think it should have been towed.

Emergency No Parking signs were put up Wednesday night, saying that cars parked on the street had to be moved Thursday night. I had parked my car Wednesday morning, and did not come back to my house until Thursday evening, where I found my car had been towed.

Those signs were put up one other time since I've been here, but in that instance they were put up a week in advance. Do you know if the signs are supposed to be put up further in advance? Has anyone fought a charge like this and won? I plan on fighting it anyway, but I figured I'd get all the information I could.

I should note that I did have to pay cash to get my car out of the impound, but I did not sign anything saying I was guilty of such-and-such.

posted by scrutiny to law & government (14 comments total)

I assume this is going to vary by jurisdiction so you will want to talk to the parking enforcement people to get a handle on the lead time for those signs.
posted by mmascolino at 7:26 AM on July 31

If it was really an "emergency," they might not have had much advance warning about closing the street or whatever they did, and might have had to just get all those cars out of there ASAP. Like mmascolino said, it probably varies from place to place, but if I were in charge, I'd reduce or eliminate the fees to tow and store your car if you could prove that you were not in the area from the time the signs were put up to the time your car was towed.
posted by LolaGeek at 7:35 AM on July 31

I can't speak for your town, but in *my* town, one of the laws they screw people on is that you have to move your car every 24 hours. They'll chalk your wheel to see if it moved.

If it's the same for you, they might just say you shoulda come back sooner. But yea, that stinks.
posted by TomMelee at 7:55 AM on July 31

Seconding TomMelee's comment. Many towns/cities have ordinances saying that vehicles cannot occupy street spaces for more than a set period of time (often 24 hours). Not only does this give them the ability to tow abandoned cars, it also provides a little bit of wiggle room for situations like this. Check to see what your local ordinance is because yeah, they might just say "it was parked illegally" anyway.
posted by proj at 7:56 AM on July 31

This is the sort of thing where your elected officials might be able to help grease the wheels of bureaucracy. Talk to your local councilman or perhaps even contact the mayor's office.
posted by caddis at 8:00 AM on July 31

It's possible that they have a requirement to post the signs with a certain lead time. Also possible that they give towing companies the ability to tow cars without even being called. Not uncommon for tow trucks to be overly aggressive in this instance.
posted by theora55 at 8:18 AM on July 31

The only standard parking rules are street sweeping rules. No parking east side Tues/Fri 10a-noon, no parking west side Mon/Thurs 10a-noon.

This wasn't an emergency in the normal sense of the word. They had scheduled the street to be repaved and needed to move the cars off. When they had previously scheduled the repaving, the signs were up for a week, and then on the scheduled day they were taken down and nothing happened at all.

Kind of frustrating, really.
posted by scrutiny at 8:28 AM on July 31

You'll have to look into the Jersey City city ordinances. In San Francisco, signs must be placed at least 72 hours before the effective date and time for the citation and/or towing to be valid.

Here's the relevant portion of the SF Traffic Code ordinance [PDF] that describes the advance notice and how a SF resident could fight it. Hopefully this helps a bit with your research.

No person shall stop, park or leave standing any vehicle, whether attended or unattended, on any street where the Department of Parking and Traffic has erected or caused to be erected appropriate signs giving a minimum of 72 hours' notice of the effective dates and times of any temporary parking prohibition, provided that this Section shall not apply to a vehicle when such vehicle is actually engaged in making delivery or pickup of construction materials being used at the site of the construction work that necessitated issuance of the permit.

For any sign which is posted and not in compliance with this Section, the temporary parking restrictions shall not be effective, and the Department of Parking and Traffic shall not cite or tow vehicles at these locations. When a vehicle is removed from a street at the request of a permittee pursuant to this Section and a post-storage hearing determines that as a result of the permittee's improper posting of the required signs, reasonable grounds did not exist for removal, the responsible permittee shall reimburse the City and County of San Francisco for the cost incurred in storage and towing. If a permittee fails to provide reimbursement or to agree to assume all liability for any improper posting future requests by that permittee for removal of vehicles in violation of this Section shall be denied.

The responsible permittee shall be given timely notice of the vehicle owner's request for a post-storage hearing and the time and place of such hearing.
posted by junesix at 9:18 AM on July 31

I think you may be out of luck. It sucks that you didn't get enough notice to move the car yourself, but it was towed because they needed to repave the road -- not just to punish you, as is usually the case. The car had to be moved, they moved it, and they're charging you for that.

That said, I was able to not pay anything when they towed my car (to punish me for parking tickets). The tow-yard person had told me that if it was true that I had paid my tickets already, and I could prove it, then city hall would give me a waiver for the tow fees. Armed with my receipts from the DMV, I went down there, and they had NO IDEA what I was talking about. What waiver? There is no such thing as a waiver. You may have paid the ticket at the DMV, but the city has not received the money, and it is your responsibility to call the city to make sure DMV transfers the funds. What is the name of the person who told you there was a waiver? After literally an hour and a half standing there arguing with the clerk, her supervisor, and her supervisor... a pre-printed waiver form was handed to me, appropriate box ticked, and I was on my way.

I think I got one of the non-existent waivers not because I was in the right -- they didn't care about that -- but because I wouldn't leave without it. You might try it. Just do be unshakable in your conviction that city hall has the power to waive tow fees at a city impound lot, regardless of the astonishment this wild claim may cause.
posted by Methylviolet at 11:09 AM on July 31 [1 favorite]

I bet the emergency sign was because of the water main breaks. Not sure if that helps or hurts, but I'll bet a lot of other people also got towed that night.
posted by bink at 12:05 PM on July 31

I bet some of your neighbors got towed too. Find them and get in touch with your elected officials together. One complaining citizen is an annoyance, a group of them will lose you the next election! This is bread and butter stuff for your city councilman's office.
posted by zachlipton at 2:04 PM on July 31

Well, when I used to run a contractor's office in Hoboken and had to get those signs put up for construction work, the town required 72 hour notice before they towed. I usually put the requests in far enough advance so that people had an extra day or so in order to move their cars. We would also make an attempt to have the Parking Authority make calls if we knew who the cars belonged to (it really does help to have accurate phone numbers on those little registration forms you fill out every year).

Did you happen to take pictures by any chance? (I learned that lesson the hard way after seeing that the signs on my street weren't consistent from one end of the block to the other.) Good luck.
posted by dancinglamb at 7:22 PM on July 31

So, it looks like Jersey State Law is that the signs have to be up 48 hours in advance. They weren't, so I'm going to try to get my money back. Thanks for the help everyone!
posted by scrutiny at 10:22 AM on August 28

Alright, so I've finally gone through all the hoops and here's the breakdown of what happened after I got my car back:

First, the officer thought he was doing me a favor by not reporting the ticket (as that would incur another fee) so I had to wait the normal processing time plus another month or so of calling about the ticket before the court finally got a hold of it.

Then, I had to defend my position in court. I was found not guilty, which means that I could now recoup my losses from the towing incident.

The car was towed by the Jersey City Incinerator Authority, and in order to get the refund I have to go through the BCI division of the Jersey City Police Department. I gave the officer there my ticket number and the case# from my towing receipt, and he's confirmed that I was indeed found not guilty.

Now, I get some sort of form mailed to me in 4-6 weeks which I will bring to the Incinerator Authority to receive my refund.

It's been about 3 1/2 months since the car was towed now, so I should receive my refund a full four moths or so after my car was towed. All things considered, that's not too bad.
posted by scrutiny at 11:10 AM on November 16