My wife just called me to tell me that we received a ticket for having the renewal tab on our license plate in the wrong location on the plate. It’s covering the renewal month (Sep), instead of the last renewal year (2005).
The ticket is a whopping $95… (Jesus Christ on a crutch!!!)
When I bought the tabs, I accidentally placed one over the wrong sticker on the car. I went back into the License bureau and asked what I should do, since the stickers are permanent, and tend to tear any stickers beneath it. They told me that it should be fine, so long as the newest one was visible.
These tabs cost me $117. I would have paid the $14.50 to get replacement tabs to save the potential $95 dollar fine.
WTF is with the $100 fines for something as minor as putting the sticker in the wrong place? I understand penalizing those that didn’t renew it, but it’s on the damn plate!
And according to the few websites that have this info published for the county the ticket was issued in, this is the MINIMUM fine you can be assessed for any vehicle violation! Lack of seatbelt or expired tabs is $102, a signaling violation is $102, even littering will set you back $142.
So, a hearty “fuck you” to:
A. our politicians for criminalizing a minor mistake,
B. another for the police officer who was diligent enough to notice that the
tab was on the wrong side of the license plate, and prick enough to write
a ticket, rather than a warning or note.
C. The clerk at the registrar’s off for telling me it was “OK” rather than telling
me to buy a new tab, and,
D. me, for believing the clerk.
I just called the courthouse to see what I need to do to fight it. I need to show up and wait, sometime between 9:00 and 3:30 on a business day. When a hearing officer is available, I can grovel appropriately.
In downtown St. Paul. Having to park in the ramps and figure out where I need to go in the courthouse.
Plus, go to the registrar and get a new set of tabs, so I can put them in the correct places.
All told, if they waive the fine, this will still cost me $25, not including lost work time.
We elect our judges, but they just enforce what laws/fines the legislature votes on. And the state legislature decided in 2003/2004 to raise fines rather than have enough balls to pay for their programs with tax increases.
So, they appeased the masses by not raising taxes, but hid all of the increases in fines and surcharges.
The ticket fighting thing is just as much a scam as the ticket is in the first place. Many years ago I got some dumb parking ticket, went to fight it, and they told me I needed to come back on another day, rather than the date on the ticket. I was unemployed, with nothing to do all day long, and it STILL wasn’t worth the time and effort.
One new thing was in NYC you could fight a ticket over the internet, or by letter. That was nice when I got dinged 3 times in a week for not having my temporary registration sticker in the right place, even after trying to put it in the right place and printing an 8.5"x11" sign for my dashboard saying “Registration sticker is here —>” I learned, you need your documents 100% correct if you’re going to park on the street in NYC.
Of course, we Americans also elect our state legislatures and governors. If we want laws like this repealed, they are the people to complain to.
Having said that, traffic offenders and other assorted criminals are a good target for revenue in the legislature’s eyes, because traffic offenders don’t have any lobbyists fighting them when they pass laws to raise fines.
Call up your local news station/comsumer reporter.
Ah, court is probably bullshit too. If there is a law on the books stating that wrongly-placed stickers are punishable by a $95 fine, then the city wants their money.
The other day, my brother noticed that his registration tags had expired7 months ago! Apparently, he did pay his fees, but the tags got lost/stolen in the mail, and he just never thought about it. He called the DMV, and they just sent him another set. The clerk said that tags get stolen all the time (this is in L.A.).
I guess he’s lucky they didn’t automatically fine him for driving with the expired tags!
Hehehe. I recentlyt got a notice in the mail that my tags were about to expire, and that before I could renew them I have to have the vehicle inspection that I somehow didn’t do 18 months ago![SUP]*[/SUP] Having not taken my car in for the inspection in a timely manner, my registration had been suspended for 17 months! And I never knew about it.
I called the MVA and they were quite helpful – I rescheduled the inspection, and once that was done I was able to renew my tags on-line and print out a temporay tag on my laser printer that you tape to your rear window.
[SUP]*[/SUP]I’m convinced that I never received notice that I needed the inspection, but snce the date the MVA claimed to have sent out notice co-incided with the birth of my twins, I’ll accept the possibility that I just missed it in all of the confusion.
I’m pissed off because my lovely borough enforces opposite-side parking. People on my block have more than one car per household and most of us don’t have off-street parking. So there’s often no where to park.
I now have to pay yet another $15 fine to the damn borough because there is no where to park.
And if you move your car across the street on alternate-side days, make sure you keep your ass plunked in the driver’s seat until EXACTLY 8 AM (and move it back at EXACTLY 11 AM), because Bloomberg’s vultures are just waiting to pounce.
– Uke, recipient of a $115 parking ticket dated March 2, 7:56 AM