A vigilant NBC\u202f5 viewer who received a parking ticket in his Garland neighborhood ended up uncovering what officials in a neighboring city are calling a \u201cmistake.\u201d<\/p>\n
It is an \u201cerror\u201d that could happen in communities sharing boundaries.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not the infraction that Donny Triplett had a problem with.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was for parking in the wrong direction. I\u2019m not going to argue that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
What he takes issue with is who posted the $45 citation on his truck one Saturday morning in late July.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s something that\u2019s never happened in the 21 years he\u2019s called Garland home.<\/p>\n
\u201cI went inside to pay it, but then I realized it did not say the city of Garland, it did not say the County of Dallas, it said the city of Dallas,\u201d said Triplett. \u201cI do not live in the city of Dallas.\u201d<\/p>\n
Despite bordering the city of Dallas, the 4600 block of Princeton Dr., where Triplett lives, is completely inside the Garland city limits.<\/p>\n
Something was not right, he thought, but he never imagined how difficult it would be not only to clear his case but also how many more people had also been cited.<\/p>\n
\u201cI called Garland’s non\u2011emergency number, and they said Dallas does not have the authorization to ticket people in the city of Garland, so it started from there,\u201d said Triplett.<\/p>\n
It took days and multiple calls dealing with double the bureaucracy that ended in dead ends.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe city of Dallas was saying that you need to get with the city of Garland and let them work this out, so I got hung in the middle,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Triplett researched Garland\u2019s city website and online public records and discovered that the cities respond differently to this type of violation.<\/p>\n
The city of Garland has lowered the fine amount and type of violation.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf I\u2019d gotten a Garland ticket, which is who should have gave it, a ticket was only $20,\u201d he said. \u201cThese tickets were for $45 each, so we\u2019re paying more for the city of Dallas tickets and where is that money going? I\u2019m paying out of my pocket to finance Dallas?\u201d<\/p>\n
Triplett is grateful for a Garland neighborhood police officer who stepped in and contacted the city of Dallas.<\/p>\n
He was eventually able to successfully contest his citation and reached out to NBC\u202f5\u2019s Maria Guerrero to advocate for anybody else mistakenly cited.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I drove down the street, there was 14 tickets on my street,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Neighbor Gemma Pai is among a number of Garland residents who were also issued a citation for parking in the wrong direction.<\/p>\n
Pai recalls watching as a female officer went from car to car issuing the tickets.<\/p>\n
Unlike Triplett, Pai says she had her son pay the $45 ticket, fearing the subsequent fines of $85 and $115.<\/p>\n
Although she did find it odd.<\/p>\n
\u201cI said, they can do that also,\u201d she said. \u201cWell, maybe? I don’t know, but you know, we’re not in the power.\u201d<\/p>\n
After NBC\u202f5 took their complaints to the city of Dallas, its Department of Transportation and Public Works acknowledged in a statement on Friday:<\/p>\n
\u201cOn July 26, one of the city\u2019s new parking enforcement officers unintentionally crossed into Garland and issued 13 citations on the 4600 block and 4700 block of Princeton.<\/p>\n
Seven of those citations have since been voided at the request of Parking Enforcement. Two were dismissed through administrative hearings. Four of them were paid and were unable to be voided, but refunds are being processed for those four paid tickets.<\/p>\n
While not common, these types of errors can occur along city boundaries. When the City learns of these cases, it verifies whether the citations were outside of city limits and voids them. If payments were made, the City initiates a process to refund them. It is standard procedure to review these cases to ensure they are avoided in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pai simply doesn\u2019t buy the \u201cmistake.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think it\u2019s a simple mistake,\u201d she said. \u201cI don\u2019t think that they don\u2019t know what is this [city.\u201d<\/p>\n
Triplett, who has been dealing with medical problems, says he can\u2019t help but feel disappointed in his own city, \u201cbecause I was hoping from the beginning that Garland from the beginning would stand up and take control of this situation\u2026 Could I have been an innocent mistake? Yes, it could have been, but it should\u2019ve been corrected.\u201d<\/p>\n
If not for his tenacity, Triplett’s neighbor says the error may not have ever been fixed.<\/p>\n
According to the city of Dallas, drivers who feel they were ticketed while parked outside the city limits should contact Parking Enforcement and Management.<\/p>\n
The office can verify the situation, determine if other citations are affected, and move forward with the refund process.<\/p>\n
A city of Garland spokesperson provided NBC\u202f5 with the following information on Friday, stating:<\/p>\n
\u201cCity Marshal\u2019s office who is responsible for Garland\u2019s parking enforcement. They confirmed that no tickets were issued on Princeton Drive from the City of Garland around July\u202f26. In case you need any additional information regarding Garland\u2019s parking enforcement, here’s a link to our City Marshal\u2019s page on the City website.<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A vigilant NBC\u202f5 viewer who received a parking ticket in his Garland neighborhood ended up uncovering what officials…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":168917,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5138],"tags":[5229,7371,7372,13399,358,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-168916","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fort-worth","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-fort-worth","10":"tag-fortworth","11":"tag-garland","12":"tag-texas","13":"tag-tx","14":"tag-united-states","15":"tag-united-states-of-america","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","18":"tag-us","19":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115077619617718439","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=168916"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168916\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/168917"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=168916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=168916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=168916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}