Reading parking meters a labor of love

Apparently wanting to drive shoppers out of downtown and to the malls, Spokane officials have upped the parking meter rates and will force the public to plug the machines two extra hours a day.

The Draconian advancements take place Tuesday and will supposedly give the city a 25 percent revenue boost.

Not to mention a boost in empty storefronts due to dwindling business.

I’m sorry the election is over. I’d love to travel back in time and NOT vote for some of these numbskulls all over again.

But that’s not what today’s column is about.

Today’s column is meant as a reminder. No matter how riled you get over that next parking ticket, remember: it’s not Dan Brown’s fault.

Brown scoops coins out of meters and slaps yellow envelopes on windshields for a living. He’s one of the city’s half-dozen or so parking enforcement commandoes.

I started feeling sorry for Brown and his co-workers while reading the bad news about the changes in city core parking.

Parking enforcement, as I’ve observed before, is the most efficient wing of Spokane government.

These people have a psychic knack when it comes to homing in on expired meters.

It’s a tough job. Although parking enforcers don’t make the policies, they invariably get the blame.

In his 21 years on the job, Brown has been cursed at and flipped off. He’s been pushed and pelted with snowballs.

I first met Brown back in 1995 after he got in some trouble for tackling a young punk who spat on him.

The teenager broke his collarbone in the fall. Fearing a lawsuit, city weasels put Brown in hot water.

I took Brown’s side in print and I’d do it again. Had I been in his shoes that spitter would have been spitting teeth.

On Friday, I met Brown near Deaconess Medical Center and accompanied him for a section of his collection route. Now 60, Brown is a bit more wrinkled than the last time I saw him but he still looks trim and fit.

Despite the abuse and having to work through every whim of weather, Brown said he still loves what he does.

“I like being outside. I like the fact that I’m basically working on my own.”

Brown chuckled when he started recalling the avalanche of lies that he has been told.

That’s a curious thing about a parking ticket, he said. Getting one will make a liar out of just about anyone.

“I was going to get change.” That’s probably the most oft-told fib.

One elderly woman once told Brown that she couldn’t get back to her car in time because she was stuck in an elevator.

“It’s not a major thing,” said Brown of parking tickets. So people think “it’s OK to lie.”

One of my more inventive co-workers once tried to get a parking ticket canceled by claiming he was from France.

He dialed City Hall from his desk phone in the newsroom. Affecting perhaps the worst French accent in history, he then told a city worker something like: “Ziz tickeet eez an outrage!”

I almost fell out of my chair from laughing.

It didn’t work. The ticket stuck.

Brown wrote only two tickets during the hour or so that I tagged along with him. Most of the meters we inspected offered up to 10 hours of parking.

Only a complete ninny lets a 10-hour meter expire.

The most ticketed area?

Over by the Spokane County Courthouse, said Brown.

That makes sense. The wheels of justice move as if mired in molasses. There’s rarely enough time on a parking meter to accommodate it.

Brown is a good guy. I’m guessing the city’s other parking enforcers are OK, too.

So cut them some slack next time you see them pinning one of those dreaded citations under your windshield wiper. They aren’t ticketing you. They’re just ticketing your car.

My advice probably won’t stick. That’s because there’s only one rule when it comes to what Dan Brown does for a living.

Brown laughed. “It’s always our fault,” he said.