Abuse of handicapped parking permits apparently is a sore point with many readers, as evidenced by these questions/complaints: Many rankled by misuse
of handicapped parkingQ: There is a brown (vehicle) with a handicapped placard displayed that parks for a full day, nearly every working day, on Halekauwila Street next to the federal building. It’s usually in the same metered stall, which is supposed to be limited to two-hour parking. Can you look into this?
Q: I see able-bodied kids and young adults driving their parents’ cars, which have valid handicapped parking permits. The new citizens patrol to check on parking abuses needs to see who’s driving the car, not just if they have a permit.
Q: At Honolulu Community College, spots are sometimes taken by people who are not handicapped, but are not given tickets. At Curtis and Kawaiahao streets on any given day, you see these passes badly abused by the people who work for (a certain state agency).
To start, let’s lay out the jurisdictions involved. The state -- under Hawaii Revised Statutes 295-51 -- sets out the rules and regulations for those special parking permits. The permits are issued by the Department of Transportation, but the county transportation departments are in charge of physically distributing them, while the police are responsible for enforcement.
On Oahu, the city Department of Transportation Services has issued 20,444 permanent permits and 740 six-month temporary permits. To get one, you need to provide a certificate of disability from a licensed physician and pay $10. The law spells out the kinds of disabilities that would qualify a person for a handicapped parking permit.
If you witness an abuse, call 911 and say you have a non-emergency violation to report, said police Capt. Mike Hama. It will not be handled as a top priority, he acknowledged, but will be addressed by patrol officers.
In November and December, there were more than 1,000 citations involving handicapped parking violations. The fine is $150.
In the Halekauwila Street case, if the car is parked for as long as noted, the driver is clearly in violation. The permit allows a driver to park, “without payment of metered parking fees in any metered or unmetered parking space, for a maximum of 2
1 / 2 hours or the maximum amount of time the meter allows, whichever is longer.” The same is true in the Curtis/Kawaiahao Street case.
We left out the name of the agency cited in the third question because a spokesman said emphatically its vehicles were not at fault: “We don’t have any handicapped people working for us and we don’t have any handicapped parking permits” issued to the office.
In general, not only do some people abuse handicapped parking privileges, they also steal placards or forge them, Hama said.
Regarding the experimental civilian patrols, in which 20 people have been deputized, “We want them to avoid confrontation,” Hama said. “They will make sure there is a valid sticker,” but they will not confront drivers.
Francine Wai, executive director of the Commission on Persons with Disabilities, said lawmakers this session are considering two bills to strengthen enforcement of handicapped parking laws and clarify penalties: HB19 and HB1833 and their Senate counterparts, SB1619 and SB1576.
The commission, an advocacy group for the handicapped, helped draft the rules for the permits.
Meanwhile, as current permits -- now placed on dashboards -- expire, they will be replaced with hanging placards and/or special license plates, Wai said.
The change is a result of federal law, which seeks to make the placards uniform across the nation. The idea is, if you have a Hawaii placard, it should be acceptable in any other state.