WICHITA, Kan. (AP) - Wichita is reinstating the legally contested practice of marking tires with chalk to keep track of how long a vehicle is parked.
The city suspended the parking enforcement tactic after a federal appeals court found that it was unconstitutional, likening it to entering a property without a search warrant. But the case isn’t binding in Wichita because it was decided by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee. Kansas is in a different circuit, noted city spokeswoman Megan Lovely.
“After reviewing the opinion of the court, we have elected to … continue chalking tires to monitor parking,” Lovely said in a statement to The Wichita Eagle. “Enforcing parking restrictions is crucial to our local economy - businesses depend upon the public having quick and convenient access to their locations.”
The suspension of chalking in Wichita also coincided with a lengthy process of filling vacancies in the parking enforcement department. At least one additional worker has been hired and has been observed chalking tires and writing tickets in Old Town since the beginning of the year.
Philip Ellison, a lawyer who represented a woman who received more than a dozen $15 tickets from Saginaw, Michigan, in the case that led to the 6th Circuit decision, said the ruling puts cities nationwide on notice that chalking tires could be constitutionally suspect, even through it doesn’t directly apply to communities outside the circuit.
“I think that your parking enforcement officials there in Wichita are taking a big risk, because one court’s already ruled it’s unconstitutional and that means they have actual knowledge it’s likely unconstitutional,” he said. “And if they continue to go forward, that puts the actual individual officer using the chalk liable under the federal civil rights laws.”
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