Several North New Hyde Park residents living on streets with limited parking are riled about recently receiving parking tickets for parking their cars in front of their own driveways.
The residents say the practice of parking in front of their driveways had been permitted by Town of North Hempstead code enforcement agents for decades, but one code enforcer recently issued a rash of tickets.
“We live in cul-de-sac and because of the cul-de-sac, it’s impossible to park on the street,” said Joseph Abberton, a 30-year resident of Jara Court. “There’s just not enough room. The law itself seems to be ridiculous.”
Abberton said his daughter, Christine, was ticketed three weeks ago for parking a car registered to her mother, Kathy Abberton, in front of their driveway.
He said his daughter typically parks the car in front of their driveway when she returns from work at night to avoid parking near Hillside Grade School, where he said groups of teenagers congregate to drink beer and smoke marijuana.
Abbertson said if the town was changing its practice about not ticketing cars on the small eight-house cul-de-sac, it could have issued a warning about the way the cars were being parked rather than issuing the $100 ticket on his wife’s car.
“I think it’s unfair given the current economic circumstances in Nassau County. I think we’ve been abandoned by these people and they’re trying to make money on us,” Abberton said.
His wife, Kathy, complained at a recent Town of Hempstead meeting about the apparent change in code enforcement.
Town of Hempstead Supervisor Jon Kaiman told the residents at the meeting that town code enforcement officials are unable to determine whether someone blocking a driveway lives in the home or not.
Kaiman said the town board could consider ways to avoid ticketing residents parking in their own driveways.
“We enforce our own codes,” said town spokesman Collin Nash.
Nash said town codes prohibit parking in front of a private or public driveway.
Jara Court resident Maxine Yarczower had also complained about the tickets being issued on their street.
“As for blocking the driveways, I do it all the time,” Yarczower said last week.
She said her son, Mark, had just pleaded not guilty in his first town court appearance for a ticket he received for parking his truck in the wrong direction. She said her sons parks the truck the wrong way so she can more easily get into the driver’s seat when she drives the truck.
Abberton and Yarczower both conferred with town Councilwoman Lee Seeman after making their comments at last month’s town board meeting but said they had not heard from Seeman since.
Seeman said there have been no new developments on the situation since the town board meeting.
Michael O’Donald of Evans Street said his son was ticketed a few weeks ago while his car was parked blocking the driveway of his father’s house as a he was moving things from the house to his car.
O’Donald said a neighbor of his on nearby Nugent Street has been blocking his driveway with parked cars he owns since a car was stolen from a neighbor’s driveway recently.
He said he believed the code enforcement agent who had issued the tickets was recently hired.
“I understand she’s a new employee of the town. She’s overzealous, enforcing the law to the letter of the law,” O’Donald said.
