Collection of outstanding debts owed Baltimore needs attention

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It’s not only fiscally woeful, but it also evidences a lack of competency in city government. We are addressing what has been disclosed or claimed as millions of dollars in unpaid fines and other charges due to the City of Baltimore. These include unpaid utility bills, leases, penalties, but primarily parking and traffic citations.

The city has a $64 million budget deficit and a recent audit by city government showed that the city had neglected to collect $4 million in fines and penalty revenue related to parking and other traffic matters. But we don’t believe that’s close to the full story.

Nor do Federal Hill residents concerned with illegal parking and speeding in their neighborhoods, who did their own research recently. They say that they uncovered over 100,000 delinquent traffic-related accounts linked to unpaid city-issued parking tickets. They claim the face amount of these tickets is $142 million, and with late penalties, they now exceed $280 million. If so, and the city has failed to dispute these figures, that’s an extraordinary sum and much of it seems to us like low-hanging fruit that the city should be attempting to pick.

The mayor has not disputed these claims, whether internal or from residents. But he did show his ire at the situation, railing, “There is no way in hell we should have this amount of money standing out there.” The Federal Hill residents claim they tried to present their research to the city on more than one occasion, but meetings scheduled were canceled. Eventually, they took their research to the media.

If we were mayor, we would demand a weekly list of receivables owed to the city, with aging. We would carefully examine this list to see whether receivables were building or being reduced. Heads would roll if old receivables were not being collected or if there was not a very good reason for that. To us, that oversight is a major part of the mayor’s job, especially when there is a $64 million deficit, and taxpayers are being called upon to make up that deficit.

To a large extent, the finances of a city need to be treated like a business. But we also recognize that much of the collection effort is now left to the Motor Vehicles Administration, which will not register vehicles that have unpaid tickets and fines. But apparently that remedy is not enough.

The mayor and his city solicitor can do more. Take these delinquent offenders to traffic court and obtain judgments, impose legal costs and start the running of post-judgment interest. Create an amnesty period, promote it and waive penalties on delinquent accounts if the fine is promptly paid. More cars need to be booted; hiring people to do this makes sense. But do something to collect much of this money.

One other partial solution easily at hand is to enforce traffic fines against city employees driving city vehicles. Last year, there were over 4,000 violations recorded, resulting in over $425,000 of fines. Most of these were waived.

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD MEMBERS

James B. Astrachan, Chair

Gary E. Bair

Jill P. Carter

Arthur F. Fergenson

Nancy Forster

Susan Francis

Julie C. Janofsky

Ericka N. King

George Liebmann

George Nilson

Steven I. Platt

Angela W. Russell

Debra G. Schubert

Jeff Sovern

H. Mark Stichel

The Daily Record Editorial Advisory Board is composed of members of the legal profession who serve voluntarily and are independent of The Daily Record. Through their ongoing exchange of views, members of the board attempt to develop consensus on issues of importance to the bench, bar and public. When their minds meet, unsigned opinions will result. When they differ, or if a conflict exists, majority views and the names of members who do not participate will appear. Members of the community are invited to contribute letters to the editor and/or columns about opinions expressed by the Editorial Advisory Board.