Wilmington City Council unanimously approves an ordinance reducing parking fines if the ticket is paid early.
More than a year after the city announced a parking enforcement overhaul, council voted to reduce parking fines from $40 to $25 if the violation is paid within 14 days of being issued.
Councilwoman Maria Cabrera described Wilmington’s parking system as predatory.
“We have been working on this for a while, a couple of years, and it goes back to when I first served on council in 2013, in trying to align our parking practices here in the city, which I thought the whole system was pretty predatory," Cabrera says. "But also to look back that a lot of the laws that we have on our books, especially when it comes to parking and time constrictions, some of them go back as far as 30 years but there have not been changes.”
Cabrera says the original proposal was a $10 discount if paid within three days, but argues they should give people at least a pay period to come up with the money.
“I’m hoping to prove some people wrong to say that folks are just scofflaws, that they just don’t want to pay, and that with the $25 it would be more of an incentive, and the additional time, that when you get a parking ticket for whatever reason if you’re not appealing it, that you do pay it,” Cabrera says.
If not paid after three weeks, the fine increases to $60. After 45 days, another $20 to $80, and will compound to $100 after just 90 days not paid.
Cabrera adds Wilmington is plagued with poverty, and this is one way the City can be kinder to residents’ wallets, noting surrounding cities like Philadelphia only charge $25 for their parking violations.
