Published: July 02, 2008 08:58 am      

City tows the line with nuisance calls

Officials disappointed car removals haven’t subsided

DANVILLE — Seeing that the city collected $159,770 in towed vehicle fees last fiscal year is disappointing to city attorney Dave Wesner.

This represents about 532 vehicles being towed for various public nuisances committed in the city. But it doesn’t indicate the multiyear cases and/or outstanding money owed on cases where the $300 bond wasn’t posted. The bond is in addition to towing and storage fees.

“The fact that the number is so high is disappointing. The numbers are staying consistent from where we started,” Wesner said.

So far this fiscal year, $21,445 in fines have been collected from May 1 to June 24 for towed vehicles.

The goal of ordinance changes about two years ago was to see fewer people committing violations with the penalty of towing a vehicle.

But Wesner breaks down the population into thirds. A third will never change and can be repeat offenders in having their vehicle towed. Another third will not commit a violation even once due to the fear of the vehicle tow. And the middle third could commit a violation once and be convinced not to do it again.

Wesner recently presented to aldermen a fiscal year summary report on cases filed in municipal court from May 1, 2007, to April 30, 2008.

Towed vehicles are by large the highest amount in fines and fees being collected.

The year also saw collected: $56,992 in other police fines, $25,138 in delinquent garbage fines, $22,852 in delinquent sewer fines and $12,899 in humane society fines.

There were 3,200 filed violations from Danville and surrounding communities. There were 127 cases from Tilton, 75 from Westville and 30 from Rossville.

The total fines collected for the fiscal year were $460,791.

Wesner said the system isn’t getting overwhelmed from cases in other communities as some aldermen wondered about, when about 80 to 90 cases can come up a night.

“It’s fairly minimal,” he said of the outside cases.

“It’s fairly stable,” he added of the total caseload. “The system I think still pays for itself. We’re not losing money.”

Wesner said collection of the fines and fees is always difficult, especially in the tight economic times.

For example with sewer and garbage delinquencies, he tries to recover those costs first if a person owes fines on several cases because those are ongoing operational services versus only owed fines.

The majority of fines in humane society cases are for dogs running at large and no city license, Wesner said.

There are some instances of animal hoarding and cruelty to animals.

Other smaller cases have involved exceeding the large garbage collection set outs of more than two a year, with $375 collected in fines last fiscal year; $657 collected in housing loan fund principal; and $340 collected in street reimbursement and cost/labor expenses if someone damages a street light or sign or traffic control box.

The ordinance isn’t meant to be a revenue generator.

“We don’t want people to violate the law,” Wesner said.

That was the intent to curb problems with prostitution and other crimes with the vehicle tow ordinance.

Police tow the vehicles primarily for drivers with a suspended or revoked driver’s license.

Under the ordinance, changed about two years ago, seizure and impounding of vehicles can occur immediately for certain offenses, without a first warning for violations, related to: prostitution or so-licitation for prostitution, illegal dumping, underage possession of consumption of alcohol, transporta-tion of anhydrous ammonia, reckless discharge of a firearm, possession of 10 or more grams of canna-bis, violation of the Illinois Controlled Substance Act, vandalism that results in injury to a person or damage to property, loud music or having a canceled, suspended or revoked driver’s license.

Vehicles that are seized and impounded can be bonded out by posting $300.

Carnaghi Towing & Repair co-owner Stephanie Carnaghi, who with her husband, Brian, operates Carpenter’s Wrecker Service, said about 60 percent of their towing business comes from the police tows.

A typical recent weekend, Friday, June 27 through Monday, June 30 saw them pick up 17 vehicles for public nuisance tows. Of those, only four people posted bond and picked them up right away.

Deputy Director of Police Bob Richard agreed that the majority of tows remain for people driving with suspended licenses. There could be two to three cases a day.

“We still are towing for possession of a controlled substance and illegal possession or consumption (of alcohol) by the driver,” he said.

But by far, the largest cases involve driver’s license violations.

“I really thought that $300 bond for those cars would really slow that driving after (license) suspended down; apparently not,” Richard said.

Both Wesner and Richard don’t think raising the $300 bond to $500 or more would deter the problems.

Richard, however, would like to see even more offenses added to the list for vehicle towing as a penalty, including fleeing and alluding and driving under the influence.

“It was geared to address the prostitution problem initially,” he said about stings. Police still tow for that, but not as much, he said.

Wesner said he’s seen other communities charge a $500 fine amount, but it’s resulted in more vehicles being piled on top of each other in an impound lot.

“(Some people) don’t care enough about a vehicle to go and get it,” Wesner said. “When it’s that easy to forget about the vehicle that’s towed and get another, I don’t think increased fines will help.”

He thinks the fine should stay where it is and maybe the city eventually will start to see the numbers decrease.

If there are more financial obstacles, “We may end up making the problem worse,” he said.

At least if the numbers are staying constant, they aren’t going up, Wesner added.