I see fully 50% of the metered spots nearby the office occupied by handicap placard vehicles and they don’t move all day. It’s the same vehicles every day, and they are nice cars too.

If you multiply the $27 dollars a day that these parkers do not pay in meter fees by 5 days a week and 52 weeks a year, this is over $7000 in parking fees that the city is not collecting. In addition there is no turnover for these spots since their meters do not expire, so even people willing to pay $3 an hour (in coins – like people carry that many quarters) are not able to find a spot. All people emerging from these cars are moving just fine. Yes, I do know that there are handicaps that are not immediately visible, but if the argument is that handicapped people cannot move very fast so therefore cannot get back to the car in time to pay the meter, then people who are issued placards should be required to have to have an actual physical handicap.

So… while the rest of us dutifully pay the parking meter or parking garage fees these people are abusing the handicapped placard system – ripping the city off for $7K annually per parking space and taking spaces from people who are actually handicapped or those who would pay the meter. No wonder they drive such nice cars – they are saving $7K per year!!

This rampant abuse needs to be investigated and readdressed to give actual handicapped drivers spaces to park and others metered spaces that turn over every few hours.

Please check out the neighborhood around 2nd and Howard in San Francisco. End the scam!

I don’t understand why they should be exempted from paying meter because they can easily park in the parking lot – which has elevator – and they don’t need to ‘rush back’. In any case, anybody who can’t walk fast should take that into account when they pay for the meter in the first place.

Anybody know which law enacting bodies to lobby for to get rid of this silly exemption? Failing that, maybe we can put an initiative in the ballot next time.

I want those spots available for people who truly need them. I just don’t see how you can possibly argue that’s what is happening today. It does the disabled no good to have a bunch of non-disabled people using those spots.

1. I agree that some percentage of disabled people have disabilities that are not immediately visible. My point is that literally 100 percent of the people who have the placards appear healthy to me. Surely you’d agree the number should be more like 10-30 percent tops, not 100 percent.

2. “Feeding the meter” is illegal, so that part of your reasoning is flawed.

3. This is absolutely a meaningful issue. I believe it is part of the reason for the death of retail in downtown Oakland. No parking means no customers. Plus, this is exactly the kind of “quality of life” crime that, when ignored by the government, encourages people to move up to worse crimes.

4. On the question of “impact,” I suggest you investigate the broken windows theory and its impact in New York. The theory is not perfect — far from it — but it is certainly part of that city’s revitalization. Ignoring petty crime is a big, big mistake.

Although I agree with your overall point, the line: “who actually looked disabled” is just ignorant.

People get the placards for lots of reasons, not all of them make them “look disabled”. For example, Heart problems make it hard for people to walk, but they might not “look disabled” to you. If you are going to be this ridiculous, you might as well specify what the look is that you are seeking.

The reason the handicap placard exempts people from paying at the meter is so they don’t have to run back and forth to feed a meter, which is difficult for people with handicaps.

Better to be glad you are not handicapped, and to focus on more meaningful issues. The excess numbers of handicapped placards demonstrates how poorly run even well intentioned goverment programs are in the Bay area.

Regarding your point on enforcement, I would much rather have the police focus on crime that has more impact on the lives of people in Oakland.

The problem is you’re asking me to research a lack of evidence. Meaning, no matter how hard I dig, all I can do is come up with a lack of news reports about such issues. And, you can just repeat your claim.

It’d be much simpler for you to simply point to a “conservative” city where this happens. I don’t have the time to dredge through every city in America looking for stats. I can tell you that my research did find this issue only in liberal bastions such as SF.