I get a number of constituent services requests. Believe it or not, one of the most difficult to deal with concerns parking.
Parking complaints take many forms. Often, complaints I hear deal with individuals parking in the alley between the backs of houses. If I am not mistaken, cars must be parked in a manner that allows a fire truck access in case of an emergency.
“What can we do?” I am asked often. It’s a difficult question, because in order to do something, a city official or police officer must catch the individual (or in this case, the car) in the act.
I have advised people to file roll-call complaints with the Philadelphia Police (and I have filed them myself.) This is a complaint that will be read at roll call in your police district, and (hopefully) will be acted upon regularly. I’d post a link for this, but last I checked, the website for making roll call complaints was not working.
My experience with roll call complaints is hit and miss. The Philadelphia Police are currently short-staffed, and hard-pressed to deal with the so-called “quality of life” issues. But squeaky wheels get greased, and I have found that making several complaints over time eventually gets the issue resolved.
Another action Philadelphia residents may take is simply calling 911. Again, the Philadelphia Police do not have enough staff to follow up on every complaint, but they do respond occasionally to a 911 call for parking. It has worked for me.
What I do not recommend is calling 311, or using the city website to make a 311 complaint. I won’t go into detail, but it is my experience that 311 is an inefficient – and highly unfriendly – black hole. ‘Nuff said.