Scofflaws

With streams running higher than usual, Gov. Parris N. Glendening is expected to ease today the mandatory water-use restrictions he imposed last month to deal with the state's persistent drought.The governor's office said last night that last week's storms cut the state's rainfall deficit by nearly 2 inches and that Marylanders' conservation efforts cut water consumption by 16 percent.Glendening said he was "optimistic that we will be able to provide some relief" from the curbs after his Drought Emergency Coordinating Committee makes its recommendations today.

Parking scofflaws, beware: Baltimore County is ready to roll out the wreckers.Determined to wring every penny it can out of those who fail to pay parking tickets, the county is sending letters to more than 300 motorists, warning that their vehicles might be confiscated if they don't pay up.Those letters -- aimed at county residents with three or more tickets, who owe a collective $235,000 -- are part of an aggressive enforcement effort expected to pull...

As Baltimore County officials move aggressively to step up collections from the growing legion of parking scofflaws, the Susan Meehlings of the world pose a formidable challenge.Meehling is the county's champion parking scofflaw, owing nearly $8,000 for 22 parking tickets. But the Eastwood woman, whose liquor store business failed last year -- and whose car was towed two years ago because of the tickets and sold for scrap -- said the county isn't likely to collect."I don't have anything for them to take.

Nearly 10,000 Baltimore residents have made the "Jury's Most Wanted List" for having skipped jury duty three or more times, and an angry Circuit Court judge yesterday began sentencing the worst offenders to all or part of the day in jail.Judge Edward J. Angeletti convicted a day care worker, a cement mixer, a senior citizen and an advertising copywriter of contempt of court and ordered that they spend several hours in the courthouse lockup.All but the senior citizen were taken away in handcuffs.

Here's a plan to make folks drive betterFive young people were killed tragically at Woodlawn by a car out of control. Articles July 22 described in very telling terms how dangerously some people drive with scant respect for the law.All of us have witnessed scofflaws going through red traffic lights or weaving through dense traffic, passing on the right and tailgating. Here is a solution:A police vehicle with white color and intimidating lights on the roof is a strong deterrent. Scofflaws drive conservatively and politely in the proximity of one of these official vehicles.

Kenny Hall is a night-shift guard at a prison, so he understands the importance of paying debts. That is why he showed up at the city's parking fines section at 7:30 a.m. yesterday -- an hour before the office opened.Mr. Hall, 31, was at the front of yesterday's line to take advantage of the city's second parking amnesty, which began Aug. 1. The program, last offered in the fall of 1992, allows parking scofflaws to pay off delinquent tickets without shelling out for the hundreds of dollars they owe in late fees.

BEFORE YOU read another word here, do the world a favor.Gather up all the overdue books, videos, CDs, etc., you have from a public library and return them.Now -- presuming you've done what I asked -- don't you feel better?It turns out that libraries all over the country are missing tens of millions of items that were borrowed but never returned. And some of the folks who run these libraries are starting to get pretty miffed about it.In fact, they're asking law enforcement officials to go after the worst library scofflaws as if they were serious criminals.

A city finance official is contemplating court action against flagrant scofflaws who ignore an amnesty program for parking tickets issued from 1986 through 1989.Since the amnesty program began on Sept. 1, the city has collected just $97,000 -- less than 3 percent of the approximately $3 million owed for unpaid parking tickets issued during the four-year period.Ottavio Grande, acting city collector, said yesterday that he is disappointed with the response to the program and he is considering lawsuits against some of the worst scofflaws if they fail to ante up by the program's Oct. 31 deadline.

The name of the acting city collector, Ottavio Grande, was misspelled in a story that appeared in yesterday's editions of The Evening Sun, which regrets the error.Notice to parking scofflaws: Your prayers have been answered.In a move to collect some $3 million in outstanding fines, the city has set a two-month amnesty period for penalties tacked onto parking tickets issued from 1986 through 1989."This is your last chance to pay those old parking tickets left in the drawer for years," City Council President Mary Pat Clarke said yesterday that as the Board of Estimates approved the amnesty, which begins on Sept.

Brian Cugle, 14, of Ellicott City, doesn't wear a bicycle helmet. Neither do most of his friends."Only the real ego-trip cops worry about hassling kids about the bicycle helmet law," Brian said. "Most of the time, the police just drive right by and yell at you, 'Hey, where's your helmet?' "Bill D'Ambrisi, 11, also of Ellicott City, won't wear a helmet, either. "Motorcycle riders don't have to wear them," he said while riding along a quiet stretch of Linwood Drive, right across the street from police headquarters.

New trash plan frugal, efficient Under the city's proposed "One Plus One" plan, trash would still be picked up twice a week ("A perfect day for tidying up," April 19). Residents would be required, however, to separate their trash into separate containers for recyclable and nonrecyclable waste. The plan also includes reconfigured, more-efficient trash collection routes that would eliminate the dreaded holiday trash black-out days. And the city has also promised to step up enforcement efforts to stop trash scofflaws - those who litter, dump illegally or fail to use proper containers.

Scofflaw motorists owe Baltimore roughly $181 million in overdue parking fines. That's a potential windfall - about six years' worth of slots revenue once gaming comes to town. Or put another way, it's enough to lower the city's property tax rate by nearly 50 cents for one year; right now, city homeowners are picking up the tab for parking violators. The city's effort to cash in on some 459,000 unpaid tickets by hiring a private collection firm has sparked protests -and a Facebook campaign - from motorists who have seen their $21 parking citations balloon to hundreds of dollars because of penalties.

This is how Jeffrey Davis reacted yesterday moments after a team of Baltimore parking agents slapped a shiny yellow boot on the left front wheel of his Ford Probe: "I don't know why I got a boot!" And then: "This doesn't make no sense!" Finally: "What else will go wrong?" What Davis did not notice (or appreciate) at first was that the metal lock on his wheel was a new device that gives him the option of removing it himself after paying parking tickets with a credit card over the telephone.

The Baltimore Sheriff's Office has apprehended dozens of child-support scofflaws in raids this week that were scheduled to coincide with Mother's Day. Deputies began the enforcement sweep early Monday morning and plan to continue through today. They have also joined with officials from neighboring counties to identify and pursue parents who are delinquent in their child-support obligations. As of yesterday afternoon, deputies had taken 83 people into custody as part of "Operation Mother's Day," Sheriff John W. Anderson's office said.

From: Gregory P. Kane, Disgruntled Citizen Menaced by Dirt Bike-Riding Scofflaws Re: Dirt bike-riding scofflaws Dear Mayor Sheila Dixon and Gov. Martin O'Malley: It happened soon after I made the turn on to Oakley Avenue from Park Heights Avenue. My first sign that there might be trouble was when I saw the two dimwits standing in the middle of the street at the corner of Oakley and Palmer avenues. "Ah!" I said to myself. "And here we have two more geniuses who have no idea why the word sideWALK has 'walk' in it."

Parking violators, be warned - the city's parking control agents are about to get tech-savy. The Baltimore Department of Transportation is set to debut Tuesday a fleet of computerized, hand-held ticket-writing machines designed to make the job of parking enforcers more efficient. Parking control agents will enter a vehicle's information as they do now, except that instead of writing on a preprinted parking ticket, agents will type the information on a hand-held computer that will also print the violations.

NATIONAL Ryan drops Senate campaign Republican senatorial candidate Jack Ryan of Illinois abruptly abandoned his bid for Congress yesterday, amid a furor over sex club allegations that horrified fellow Republicans and made him a target of late-night comedy. [Page 1a] Internal report chastises EPA The EPA enforcement office has bungled the job of making sure that oil refineries - one of the nation's biggest pollution scofflaws - reduce pollution as promised, the agency's own inspector general concludes.

With streams running higher than usual, Gov. Parris N. Glendening is expected to ease today the mandatory water-use restrictions he imposed last month to deal with the state's persistent drought.The governor's office said last night that last week's storms cut the state's rainfall deficit by nearly 2 inches and that Marylanders' conservation efforts cut water consumption by 16 percent.Glendening said he was "optimistic that we will be able to provide some relief" from the curbs after his Drought Emergency Coordinating Committee makes its recommendations today.

Parking scofflaws, beware: Baltimore County is ready to roll out the wreckers.Determined to wring every penny it can out of those who fail to pay parking tickets, the county is sending letters to more than 300 motorists, warning that their vehicles might be confiscated if they don't pay up.Those letters -- aimed at county residents with three or more tickets, who owe a collective $235,000 -- are part of an aggressive enforcement effort expected to pull...

As Baltimore County officials move aggressively to step up collections from the growing legion of parking scofflaws, the Susan Meehlings of the world pose a formidable challenge.Meehling is the county's champion parking scofflaw, owing nearly $8,000 for 22 parking tickets. But the Eastwood woman, whose liquor store business failed last year -- and whose car was towed two years ago because of the tickets and sold for scrap -- said the county isn't likely to collect."I don't have anything for them to take.