A new report, by the Citizens Budget Commission, showing the decline in traffic tickets in NYC, is being touted in a negative manner by media outlets who spin the lack of petty revenue collection done by police, as a loss for the city. However, it’s actually a gain for the people.
According to the Post, there were just 1,191 parking summonses handed out between Dec. 29 and Jan. 4 — down nearly 93 percent from the same period last year, when 16,008 of the dreaded orange envelopes were slapped on windshields.
Based on the weekly average ticket take of $10.5 million in fiscal 2014, the Citizens Budget Commission estimated the reduction could have bled about $10 million from city coffers.
And that doesn’t include other revenue losses from similar reductions in moving violations and court summonses during the slowdown, which is now in its third week.
Sadly we live in such a time where it is widely considered “a loss” when the government fails to extort the citizens enough to cover their expansive and often tyrannical endeavors.
Drug offenses, parking violations, traffic citations; these are not so much crimes as they are streams of revenue for the city. They are also the reason for the majority of police harassment within certain communities.