Title
Authorizing the Council Committee on Streets and Services to hold hearings to investigate the practice of "courtesy towing" by the Philadelphia Police Department, the Philadelphia Parking Authority, and private towing companies.
Body
WHEREAS, Relocation towing, more commonly known as "courtesy towing," is a practice where vehicles parked on streets that need to be closed for emergencies, construction, road maintenance, snow removal, or special events are towed away from their parking spot; and
WHEREAS, Flaws in the current system have resulted in undocumented and untracked relocations of vehicles towed by government and private; and
WHEREAS, In some circumstances vehicles are towed down the block or around the corner. However, in many cases, vehicles are towed as far as a mile away, inconveniencing vehicle owners who spend hours searching for their vehicles; and
WHEREAS, There have been instances where legally parked vehicles have been courtesy towed to illegal parking spots, where they are then ticketed, forcing owners to contest the unfair tickets in court with no way to prove they did not willfully park their vehicles illegally; and
WHEREAS, The Philadelphia Police Department's policy is to enter handwritten logs of relocated vehicles faxed over to the police radio room into a searchable database, and rely on owners of vehicles to call 911 and report their vehicles missing; and
WHEREAS, When there is no record of a courtesy towing, vehicle owners are encouraged to file stolen vehicle reports to track down the vehicle, wasting police resources and in one instance leading to a woman's arrest in another state after her relocated vehicle was recovered but its stolen vehicle status not updated by the Philadelphia Police Department; and
WHEREAS, Through a Right-to-Know request, The Philadelphia Inquirer obtained relocation logs from the Police Department and the Philadelphia Parking Authority. They discovered thousands of vehicles courtesy towed betwee...
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