A $100 parking ticket? Searching for revenues, Boston considers hiking fines

(David L. Ryan/Globe Staff)

The surprise in the envelope may be worse than you think.

By John C. Drake, Globe Staff

Drivers would be slapped with tickets as high as $100 for violating the city's parking rules in a series of steep increases in fines that would generate an additional $13 million in revenue, under the mayor's proposed budget for the new fiscal year that begins in July.

Mayor Thomas M, Menino's $2.42 billion fiscal 2009 budget hikes city spending by 5.1 percent and keeps funding for basic services largely untouched while sprinkling new cash into several community initiatives. The budget -- and new fines -- must be approved by the City Council.

Menino said the increases for parking violations, such as doubling the penalty for parking in a handicapped ramp from $50 to $100, are overdue.

"This budget shows stability at a time of real uncertainty," Menino said in a telephone interview Tuesday. "We have got to raise some new revenues to maintain that stability. Some of these fines haven't been raised in over a decade."

Drivers who park in front of fire hydrants and in fire lanes also would receive $100 fines, up from $75 and $40 respectively. The fire hydrant fine was last increased in 2000, while the fire lane penalty fine has been unchanged since 1991. Parking in a crosswalk would generate a fine of $85, up from $40.

The increases only apply to main thoroughfares of the city and the downtown area, city officials said. Except for a few small increases, fines on residential streets would be unaffected.

Councilor-at-large Michael Flaherty is opposed to increasing the fines because they could encourage people to shop and dine outside the city, and could disproportionately affect Boston residents.

"Increasing fees and fines on the backs of working families and business owners will not solve our budget woes," said Flaherty, the vice chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. "Instead of driving people out of the city we should be driving down costs of wasteful government spending."

Council President Maureen Feeney called the proposed increases "unpleasant" but said they ultimately may be necessary.

The budget "is resting on the back of our property tax, and with diminishing state support, I think that we don’t have many other options," she said.

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