Commentary: West Palm's gift to tardy parkers like rewarding a trip to the moon

By Frank Cerabino

Palm Beach Post Columnist

Friday, September 23, 2005

If you're planning to get a parking ticket, I recommend West Palm Beach.

Lanier was there to run in a 4-mile race sponsored by the Marathon of the Palm Beaches to benefit Don Chester, a member of that group's organizing committee who was paralyzed last year after being struck by a car while running across Flagler Drive.

Lanier found a metered spot near the amphitheater.

"There were two meter maids there, and they were busy writing tickets," he said. "So I put in more quarters than I thought I needed."

He walked to the start of the race at the Nancy Graham Centennial Fountain. But it started late, and the run turned out to be little longer than advertised, he said.

By the time he walked back to his car, a parking ticket was waiting for him.

"I was startled," he said.

Not by the ticket, but by the good deal he got on the fine.

It's like swiping a parking space

The $12 ticket came with a mail-in offer of $10 for free parking at city meters or parking garages.

"Twelve-dollar outlay and a ten-dollar rebate; not a bad deal," he said. "Thank you, City of West Palm Beach."

Days later, he got his free parking swipe card in the mail.

"Congratulations on purchasing a West Palm Beach City Card," it said.

He had opted for the swipe card over the other choice of taking $10 worth of stamps to be used for city parking garages.

The city started doing this a year ago.

"Everybody loves it," said Mary Lynn Blakley, a cashier with the city's parking administration.

The only hitch is you only get to do it once. The second parking ticket doesn't come with free parking.

Now, before you get the wrong idea, this concept doesn't carry over to the area of drug crimes. For example, if you get caught with a marijuana joint, there's no mail-in offer for a free bag of pot from the city.

Guns-for-gifts was on-Target idea

However, the free parking deal isn't the first time the city has come up with a novel giveaway solution to a problem.

This summer, the city tried a guns-for-gifts deal. Turn in an assault weapon, and the city forked over a $200 Target gift card. Handguns were valued at $100 gift cards; rifles and shotguns, $75.

Using Target for a gun round-up was clearly inspirational. The one-day event was so popular that city officials ran out of Target cards within the first 20 minutes and had to scramble to keep up with the dozens of guns being turned in.

So by comparison, the parking violators weren't getting as sweet a deal as the gun-toters.

"What about gift certificates?" I asked the parking office cashier. "Do you get any with a parking ticket?"

"No," Blakley said.

Maybe it's time to sweeten the pot. After all, anybody who goes to downtown West Palm Beach these days ought to be rewarded.

When the city wanted to keep guns off the street, it offered gift certificates. In this case, the city wants to keep cars and people on the street in downtown West Palm Beach, despite the maze of daunting, dusty and potholed construction.

So maybe even the people who don't plug the meters with enough quarters need to be lavished with gifts like game-show winners for braving downtown's lunar surface.

Either that, or just leave them alone if they're a few minutes late hiking back to their parked cars.