Mind your meters: St. John's to look at parking practices after losing court case

The City of St. John's will take a closer look at how it tickets motorists who park in places where there are missing meters. 

Coun. Art Puddister sought clarification Monday on what the city does in those situations. 

"Right now if people come by and find a meter where the head has been removed they can park there — we do not issue a ticket," he said to the media following Monday night's weekly public city council meeting. 

His query had been inspired by a challenge in traffic court by Warren Gibbons. 

Gibbons parked in a spot where the meter head had been removed for maintenance but reinstalled during the day, resulting in him getting a ticket. 

A traffic court judge tossed the ticket, and Puddister put a question to Jason Sinyard, the city's manager of planning, development and engineering.

Should the city cover the meters with missing heads with  bright yellow No Parking bags and just hand out tickets? asked Puddister.

"Our practice hasn't been to bag them and ticket," Sinyard said.

"Our parking enforcement staff is working with our legal staff to review that policy and that bylaw to see what's the best course of action moving forward."

Puddister also ask Sinyard and his staff to look into why there are so many missing meter heads. 

"There's dozen and dozens of meters downtown," Puddister said.

"More than I've ever seen before which have been removed so we need to find out why these things are taking place."

Sinyard said parking has just recently been moved to his department's oversight, but he did offer up one reason. 

"I know we have some issues in the downtown with meter damage due to theft, and that's knocked out a lot of meters," he said.

City staff will look into the issue and report back to council with its findings.