Disabled parking placard tiff

[fotofashion]

The smoke is still coming out of my ears a bit after an unpleasant experience this morning. Scene: WalMart parking lot, disabled parking spot. DH left me off at the front door so I would not have to walk far and went to park the car. He found a spot in the disabled area, parked, put the sunscreen in the windshield and hung the placard, as per instructions on the placard, on the mirror facing backward (so it can be read from the rear window). When we came out, we had a ticket for no placard! Well, the "person" who was handing out the tickets (and had given one to the person in the spot next to us, too), was still there so I went and knocked on her window and showed her I indeed did have my placard and it had been displayed correctly. "Oh", she says, "it wasn't visible" and showed me a picture she had taken from the front of the car. I tried to show her what the placard instructs one to do but she kept insisting that the placard wasn't visible! I got mad and just threw the ticket into her lap and told her I would not accept the ticket and left.
One thing I am wondering, are the police allowed to give infractions on private property like that? In any case I will not pay the $20.00 fine. Someone needs to learn the rules regarding the use of the placards. I assume federal rules supersede any local ones in this regard.
Thanks for letting me vent.
Beverly A.

[RosieC]

That sucks

I would have thought that if they have different rules on the placement of the placards to the standard then they should display clear signs stating that near the disabled parking spots. I would argue this one as well.

[Royal]

I would think that officers in Texas should be used to dealing with sun shades and very familiar with the procedures for them, especially parking/traffic officers.

[fotofashion]

I'm wondering if she was even regular police. She wasn't wearing a uniform, just a fluorescent yellow vest over her blouse and the car she was driving wasn't a police car either.
What is funny, too, DH looked this up and the normal fine for bad parking with a disabled placard is $200.00 not $20.00.
One thing that set me off was that if I considered myself not guilty, I was going to have to appear in court for a trial. What a waste of time both for me and for the court. I wish I knew how the other person she ticketed felt and reacted about it. I think the "official" was gone by the time he/she came back to her/his car.
Beverly A.

[Junebug]

I don't blame you for getting upset. You would think they would have printed the cards on both sides (visible from front and rear of car) so it wouldn't be an issue to begin with.

[fotofashion]

I thought I'd report on the resolution of my problem with the parking ticket. On Tuesday we got a form letter informing us that the fine was now $300.00. Mind you, this was only 9 days after the original ticket was given. After a lot of angst on my part, and seeing as I was going to be there anyway, I went to the office where the parking placards are issued to ask about the rules concerning their use. I also asked the clerk if there were differences between the state rules and city rules. She directed me to the city hall just across the street. When I asked this clerk about possible differences in the rules (I had my old placard in my hand) she mentioned that if I got a ticket she could fix the problem. I told her I had gotten one. Immediately, she looked for and found the paperwork and told me that there was no problem, we did not have to pay. The person who was handing out the tickets in the WalMart parking lot was part of a volunteer handicap parking patrol designed to root out offenders. She was as sweet as could be and was really perplexed as to why the volunteer had been recently giving out quite a few tickets and apologized for my inconvenience.
So, problem amicably solved.
Beverly A.

[Call_Me_Bob]

that really sucks! got me mad too!

glad it all got fixed for ya

[Baz in Oz]

FF, you have to make allowances for the majority of people who issue parking tickets. You won't find a lot of Rhodes Scholars or unemployed brain surgeons or rocket scientists in their ranks.

Just remember, they all have some sort of supervisor who you can appeal to.

Baz

[fotofashion]

Boy, "ain't" that the truth. The clerk who fixed the problem for me told me she had had cases where a police officer issued a ticket to someone with a disabled license plate no less. OTOH, she also recounted a case where a $300 ticket was issued and the person who paid it was so obviously a really elderly person (by looking at the very spidery handwriting) that they sent the check back and just suggested he get a parking placket.
Beverly A.

[Call_Me_Bob]

interesting.