Last November I posted photos of construction junk dumped in a handicapped parking space in the Cordell-St. Elmo public parking garage. It had been placed there by county-employed workers renovating the garage.
The embarrassing part was that county elected officials had just hectored and lectured taxpayers about not parking in handicapped spaces unless you have a permit to do so. Their expensive media campaign, called "Respect the Space," just happened to give those politicians more publicity than the issue itself.
The question at the time was, should the county have to live under the same laws it imposes upon its citizens? (And, by the way, as an advocate for the disabled for over a decade, I am in no way suggesting citizens should be able to improperly use handicapped spaces!).
Fast forward to last evening in downtown Bethesda, where the junk is still in the handicapped space. What's changed? Someone has simply ripped the disabled parking sign off the wall, and replaced it with a regular parking sign. Compare the photos below with those in my original post to verify for yourself.
Now, let's say you as a citizen were parked in an unauthorized spot. If caught, would you be allowed to simply rip a sign off and escape penalty?
A novel solution, but shouldn't government therefore live under its own laws?
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