New Traffic Agents Worth Their Weight In Added Revenue

As a means of driving up revenue, the city has funded an additional 200 Traffic Enforcement Agents and 34 Supervisors, according to Mayor Bloomberg's November budget plan.

RAYMOND W. KELLY: TEAs to net $66 million annually. TEAs would be dispersed into gridlock locations in four of the five boroughs, excluding Staten Island. Fifty percent of these agents would be assigned to Manhattan, with the remaining agents spread equally across the other three boroughs. Traffic agents would be assigned to these locations in groups of two or three and be teamed up with a supervisor and a Police Officer.

Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly told the City Council Nov. 24 that the city estimates an additional $61 million in net revenue can be generated in 2009-2010 and $66 million annually each year after that because of the new positions. In September, Traffic Enforcement Agents were given the power to write parking summonses for blocking an intersection for the first time. The city expects the new fine of $115 to further fatten its coffers.

A City Council budget note estimates these changes will bring total parking ticket revenues to $560.9 million in fiscal 2009, which concludes next June 30, and $626.8 million in succeeding years.

A New York Times analysis Nov. 28 noted that the number of parking tickets issued citywide has increased 42 percent since Mayor Bloomberg took office. At the same time, police officers are generating a significantly smaller percentage of the summonses. Since 2002, the city has hired 793 more TEAs to write summonses, which has decreased the number of parking and moving violations written by NYPD officers. In 2008, the NYPD has written 40 percent fewer parking tickets than it did in 2001, according to department records. City cops are off 12 percent from last year alone, for a decrease of near 180,000 summonses on the year. Moving violations are down, too, compared to 2007 — 6 percent — but even with 2001 levels.