35 permits seized, 236 tickets issued in accessible parking enforcement blitz: City of London

The accessible parking enforcement blitz, held from July 9 to 15, resulted in 35 permits seized and 236 tickets issued for violations across roughly 500 properties in the city.

“We used all the resources we could possibly use that week and concentrated on private and public parking lots as well,” said Annette Drost, manager of municipal law enforcement services.

“Mainly the strip malls, commercial parking lots such as Masonville, Western Fair, White Oaks Mall, Northland Mall.”

Permits were seized for being expired, fraudulent, or used by someone other than the permit holder. Drost said in many cases, people were using permits that belonged to people who are now dead.

“We found actually a number of permits that were being used last week where the person is deceased. We would ask, ‘Are you this person?’ And they would say, ‘No, that would be my spouse,’ and we said, ‘Is your spouse here with you to be using this permit?’ And then they would admit that the spouse or parent or relative had been deceased for some years now.”

Still, Drost said the majority of the feedback was positive as those with legitimate permits were appreciative of the work being done to ensure the spaces are available for them.

“Even though they were delayed maybe a minute or two, they said, ‘Thank you for doing this, we appreciate you being out here, we didn’t realize that somebody actually checked these,'” Drost told 980 CFPL.

“For the most part, pretty much all very positive feedback. Of course, the odd person who was using it fraudulently or incorrectly was not pleased to see us.”

Drost also asks that those with valid permits use them as intended, explaining that if you are driving someone who holds a permit and drop them off at the front door, you cannot then park in an accessible space.