SCRANTON -- People in Scranton's Hill Section have noticed a white car driving around their neighborhood. They've also noticed a lot of white pieces of paper on the windows of parked cars.
"I`ve noticed them driving around just in the last couple days, stopping people and giving them tickets for silly infractions," said Hill Section resident Michael McAndrew.
McAndrew has not been too happy with Scranton's new parking enforcement program that's now about a week old. Some of his neighbors though, think the little white pieces of paper have been effective in fixing parking problems.
The parking enforcement officers, Brian and Tammy Lynn, used to have desk jobs with the city. They now have the power, and new equipment, to write parking tickets. Something, police officers typically don't have time for.
The parking enforcement officers take pictures of the illegally parked cars, save them electronically, and then print tickets right from their hip.
Most of the parking tickets carry a $25 fine. City officials projected they would raise more than $300,000 in extra revenue this year. The officers would have to write at least 12,000 tickets. They are on track to reach that goal.
They told Newswatch 16 they each write an average of ten tickets per hour.
"They should obey by the law, and do the right thing," said Tammy Brent of Scranton.
Brent thinks the number of tickets will go down as parkers start to get the message. Other Scrantonians fear that the enforcement is sending the wrong message.
"I really don`t see how roaming around and giving them a family that`s trying to survive an extra $40 ticket is really going to help, you know, people enjoy, or have anything good to say about our city of Scranton," McAndrew added.