Bruce Rushton
The Illinois Times
The city of Springfield has prevailed in a lawsuit brought by Calvin Christian, who had claimed that the city’s towing-fee ordinance was unconstitutional.
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At the time, the city charged motorists arrested for certain offenses a towing fee of $500, which was lowered last year to $250. The fee was on top of charges levied by towing companies for impounding and storage services.
Christian had claimed that charging the fee amounted to unreasonable search and seizure and that the ordinance was overly vague. He also argued that motorists charged the fee were deprived of rights to jury trials and that fees charged on top of penalties for underlying offenses amounted to double jeopardy.
Not so, ruled Sangamon County Circuit Court Judge Pete Cavanagh in a June 11 dismissal order.
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Cavanagh in his decision quoted from the 2013 ruling by Schmidt, who found that the towing charge was a fee, not a fine, even at the $500 level. “The court finds the $500 fee to be a reasonable fee given the expense the city incurs in the arrest and detention of the impounded vehicle’s driver,” Schmidt wrote in his ruling. “Further, the city must care for the impounded vehicle and insure (sic) its safety. All these requirements cost money. … The $500 fee is not so high as to be strictly punitive in nature.”
The fee had generated at least $1.3 million for the city since 2010 before the city council last year lowered it to $250. Mayor Mike Houston vetoed the ordinance reducing the fee, but his veto was overrriden. The mayor had cast it as a safety issue, saying that most motorists whose cars were towed had been arrested on suspicion of drunken driving or driving without licenses and so therefore posed a danger to the public. But the council stood firm, saying that $500 was too much.
“I think it was the right thing to do for a whole number of issues,” said Ward 7 Ald. Joe McMenamin, who had pushed to lower the fee. Citizens who could not afford the $500 fee were forfeiting more than 50 vehicles a year, McMenamin said, and some of those vehicles were owned by people who were not driving.
“The accumulation of the impoundment fees together with the towing fee together with the storage fee together with the underlying offense that triggered the impoundment, all added together, often resulted in the loss of the vehicle for individuals and families that may not have been involved with the underlying offense,” the alderman said.
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Joe McMenamin for Ward 7 