Etched on a cricket bat

It is always rumored that enforcement officers have quotas and this is usually hotly denied by local government. However New Zealand has finally come clean. Witness these quotes from a local paper:

His comments come after it was claimed last week parking wardens in Wellington - working for a private company contracted to the city council - were offered incentives including iPods and holidays, the Dominion Post reported.

Christchurch wardens were expected to write seven tickets an hour, and high-scoring wardens had their names etched on a cricket bat, The Press reported

OK, I can understand the incentives. Write a hundred tickets, get an IPOD write a 1000, get a day off. But cricket can be a true incentive. Imagine – having you name etched on a cricket bat. OMG

Let's take a look at the seven tickets an hour – That's one ticket every eight and a half minutes. I'm no expert but that seems really pressing it. Even with the cricket bat incentive.

Let me be clear – I have no problem with incentives. I think it's a great idea to give bonuses or ipods or cricket bats etchings for successful enforcement officers. The only rule is that the citations have to be proper. My 10% rule (only about 1 in 10 violations are ever cited) means it's a target rich environment. Plenty of violations to go around.

My buddy Chad Lynn at the City of Beverly Hills says that the number of citations written is driven by just how strict a community wants to be. If you want to hire more officers, you can write more tickets. However then you may be seen as "over enforcing." Let's face it if the number of citations written in a community were to triple or quadruple, valid or not, one could have a revolution on one's hands.

And you might have to buy another cricket bat.

JVH

Comments

[Richard MacLean]

Greetings
Regarding your comments, I want to clarify the claims that parking wardens in Wellington have been offered iPods and holidays as incentives to issue as many parking tickets as possible.
Our parking-enforcement staff are employed by a subsidiary of an Australian company - which offers annual awards - including the chance to go into a draw for an overseas holiday - to staff who go beyond the call of duty. Staff in New Zealand, Australia and Fiji are all eligible.
One Wellington parking warden has won the trip. She was nominated for going to the aid of a woman who had tripped and hurt herself when getting off a bus. The warden rendered first aid and called for an ambulance.
Two years ago a warden was given an MP3 player after being nominated by his peers in a ‘model warden’ contest. Rather than for issuing vast numbers of tickets, the award recognised the warden’s willingness to cover colleagues’ shifts and general helpfulness.
You say that talk of quotas is always hotly denied by local authorities. This is for a good reason: despite furious claims to the contrary by our local news media, in Wellington the quotas story is an urban myth.

regards
Richard MacLean
Wellington City Council

Richard MacLean

Wellington City Council.

[Manuel]

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