City Council says it is (finally) going to investigate Philly’s ‘courtesy tow’ problem

After five years of local news stories (mostly The Inquirer, tbh), two potential class-action lawsuits (still ongoing, somehow), and an ignominious segment on The Daily Show (funny, at times), Philadelphia City Council has finally gotten around to fixing the city’s “courtesy tow” problem.

Well, Council’s going to look into it. At some point in the future. Hopefully before your car disappears.

Behold! Resolution No. 240989.

Recently passed by City Council, the resolution authorizes its Committee on Streets and Services to “hold hearings to investigate the practice of ‘courtesy towing’ by the Philadelphia Police Department, the Philadelphia Parking Authority, and private towing companies.”

“Philadelphia drivers have been frustrated,” the resolution proclaims, “with the bureaucratic nightmare of getting their vehicles back, with some viewing courtesy towing as little more than a money making scheme.”

Hearing dates have not yet been set.

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Courtesy towing — formally called “relocation towing” — is the Philly euphemism used to describe the city’s dysfunctional process of moving vehicles that are parked in legal spaces that subsequently become temporary no-parking zones due to special events, utility work, construction, weather, or other reasons.

If your car is towed by the parking authority or police to clear a parade route, for instance, you have a decent chance of finding it within a reasonable amount of time — assuming the enforcement officers logged the new location, as they are supposed to do.

But private companies often are hired to take the cars, and they don’t always relay the new location back to police. The cars can be moved around the corner, or left in another neighborhood altogether, with no record.

People have spent weeks searching for cars and are sometimes forced to report them stolen — which can cause its own set of problems.

Some cars are courtesy towed and never seen again.

The typical “nightmare” scenario mentioned in the City Council resolution is when a private towing company takes a legally parked car and drops it off in a metered or no-parking zone, with no record of the tow. Then the parking authority comes along and starts ticketing it, then tows it to its own impound lot, and can eventually initiate the process of auctioning it off.

» READ MORE: ‘Nobody is safe’: Philly officials refuse to fix courtesy-tow problem as class-action lawsuits proceed

That’s what happened to Gary Isaacs, who had to pay nearly $1,000 in fines and fees to get his car back in 2021 after it was courtesy towed from his normal parking space while he was on vacation. A towing company relocated it to a loading zone and left it there without notifying police. Isaacs, who spoke to The Inquirer at the time, was also featured on the Daily Show segment that ran in September.

“It’s like you’re looking for a lost dog or something — just walking around looking for your car,” Isaacs said earlier this year.

In 2022, the city paid $15,000 each to two courtesy tow victims to settle their lawsuits. But other victims are pressing forward with litigation in federal court. Their attorneys are seeking class-action status on behalf of potentially thousands of victims, but a judge has not yet ruled on that.

David Rudovsky, who is representing some of the victims, said they are seeking monetary damages, but also a court injunction that would force the city to start tracking where vehicles are towed — as Chicago and other cities do.

“That’s all we’re asking for,” Rudovsky said.

City officials have so far done little to address the issue in a systemic way.

The Philadelphia Parking Authority, to its credit, has been using an online database since 2020 that tracks the cars it tows. However, the PPA is not responsible for most courtesy tows.

The police department is looking to implement a similar system for the cars it tows, using $225,000 that Mayor Cherelle L. Parker included in her first budget.

But neither of those systems would track where private towing companies are taking cars — for instance, when a construction company obtains a temporary no-parking permit from the city, then hires its own towing company to clear the street. These types of situations appear to be the main cause of the problem: Drivers don’t know the new location of their car or who towed it.

Councilmember Jeffery Young, who represents parts of North Philadelphia and Center City, introduced the resolution last month calling for Council hearings on courtesy towing. Young, who was elected last year, was not available for comment Wednesday, with Council holding its second day of hearings on plans to build a 76ers arena in Center City.

Young’s spokesperson, Onyx Finney, said he called for hearings after receiving constituent complaints. She said he wants the public to have a clear sense of the city’s courtesy tow policies.

“We are looking to ensure transparency in the process,” Finney said.