Just when you think the nanny state elements of life in “blue America” couldn’t get worse, liberals come up with another bright idea. On Monday, the Washington Examiner reported on transportation legislation introduced by District of Columbia Councilman Charles Allen (D) that proposes a unique program:
Legislation introduced in Washington, DC would allow certain residents to write out parking tickets to their neighbors….The bill proposes the establishment of a Citizen Safety Enforcement Pilot Program, where the District Department of Public Works will allow up to 10 trained residents per [council] ward to be able to write up the parking infractions.
Translation: The councilman wants to get residents to snitch on their neighbors.
– Requires DDOT to create more sidewalk & bike lane connections.
– Creates a new Citizen Traffic Safety Pilot Program to help with enforcement of crosswalks, bike lanes, fire lanes, & bus stops.
– Requires DDOT create & submit a report after every fatal & critical crash in DC.— Charles Allen (@charlesallen) May 7, 2019
Apart from representing Big Government overkill, this project sounds like a recipe for turning ordinary residential disagreements into official government disputes. Under this plan, a “citizen enforcer” who has a dispute with a neighbor over a noisy pet or property boundaries—and let’s face it, the kind of person who signs up as a “citizen enforcer” has lots of disputes with his neighbors over such things—can up the ante by siccing the government on them, via a blizzard of parking and traffic tickets.
Granted, the bill provides for a $100 fine for “citizen enforcers” who knowingly file false violations, but how exactly does one prove a knowingly false violation? At best this safeguard would just invite additional bureaucracy to police the “enforcers.”
That said, seeing as how Allen thinks citizen ticketing such a grand idea, why don’t we apply it to the councilman? We already know that Allen doesn’t believe in obeying the laws he passes. He, like the rest of his D.C. Council colleagues, refuse to enroll in Obamacare, even though last year the council required all District residents to purchase Obamacare coverage, or face the prospect of having their property seized and sold.
So if you see Allen out and about on the streets of the nation’s capital, please publicly report on Twitter any and all traffic violations he may incur. Jaywalking, parking infractions, not stopping at all four-way intersections (another change included in his bill)—you name it. Maybe, after getting called out for his own transportation infractions, the councilman will realize this nanny state idea will cause more trouble than it’s worth.
