HomeMy WebLinkAboutSB2544_20180911_LetterToLackeyCity of San Luis Obispo, Office of the City Council, 990 Palm Street, San Luis Obispo, CA, 93401-3249, 805.781.7114, slocity.org
September 18, 2018
The Honorable Edmund G. Brown
Governor, State of California
State Capitol, First Floor
Sacramento, CA 95814
VIA Email: Leg.Unit@gov.ca.gov
RE: AB 2544 (Lackey): Parking Penalties.
Request for VETO
Dear Governor Brown,
The City of San Luis Obispo urges your prompt veto of AB 2544 (Lackey).
This bill would extend payment plan requirements originally contained in AB 503 (Chapter 741,
Statutes of 2017) to include citations issued prior to May 1, 2018 and also require that previously
accrued late fees be waived. It goes beyond the initial intent of AB 503 (that was just enacted last year)
and will create significant burdens to local municipalities in both costs and operations. Cities worked
with the State legislature to develop AB 503, but if retroactive provisions would have been anticipated
during that process, the language of that bill likely would be entirely different.
Individual cities throughout California are owed millions of dollars in late fees by registered vehicle
owners with outstanding citations that were assessed to cover the administrative costs of collections
and itemizations with the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). Retroactive forgiveness
proposed in AB 2544 would result in significant financial loss to local governments, while providing
an incentive for delayed payment of bona fide parking violations.
Cities have already begun implementation of the requirements of AB 503.. The additional
requirements from this bill will result in increased workload beyond what was added by AB 503.
Specifically, cities would have to verify indigent status for anyone requesting a payment plan for any
citation issued over the last five years, not just new citations under last year’s bill.
AB2544 would require staff to research and then refund fees previously collected over a prior five -
year period when each request is received. Since our city converted our processing provider during
this period of time, this would require checking in multiple systems, and increases the potential for
error. Having to perform this level of research and to verify the status of each applicant would require
additional staff to handle the additional workload while decreasing the funding available to pay for
this additional work. Doing this retroactively is punitive to the local municipalities which have
complied with all the regulations during this 5-year period, and now are being discarded because of
AB2544.
While cities share in the goal of providing assistance to people with unpaid parking violations, AB
2544’s retroactive application will create an even more burdensome process for local governments
working to simply enforce local laws. Our local streets and roads are an essential part of our overall
infrastructure and provide much more than just parking for our residents. The ability for cities to
adequately enforce our parking regulations ensures that we can continue to deliver the public services
our residents expect. Creating burdens for local government to perform the basic function of complete
parking enforcement is a poor use of limited resources.
For these reasons, the City of San Luis Obispo urges your veto on AB 2544.
Sincerely,
Heidi Harmon
Mayor
City of San Luis Obispo
cc. Assembly Member Tom Lackey assemblymember.lackey@assembly.ca.gov
Ronda Paschal, Deputy Legislative Secretary, Office of Governor Brown
Leg.Unit@gov.ca.gov
Dave Mullinax, dmullinax@cacities.org
Meg Desmond, League of California Cities, cityletters@cacities.org