Warden sacked for waiving tickets

A SENIOR Wellington parking warden has been fired after granting himself and his mate ticket immunity.

The incident has led to Wellington City Council closing a ‘‘loophole’’ that allowed the warden to enter the computer system and cancel tickets issued against him.

According to sources, the warden told colleagues not to ticket his or his mate’s cars if they saw them parked illegally.

While this often worked, the warden still occasionally got ticketed, but accessed the computer system to change the tickets to warnings.

It was not clear whether the warden did this himself or got a junior warden to do it.

The warden was caught after a tipoff to council staff from another colleague about a fortnight ago.

The council has completed an investigation and dismissed the warden, but is still looking into whether there are further issues.

Councillor Andy Foster, who chairs the transport and urban development committee, said he did not want to see the incident reflect badly on the council’s other ‘‘excellent staff’’.

‘‘We make a lot of the rules, we enforce a lot of the rules, so it is really important that people have confidence that the people we have administering those rules are doing this with the utmost integrity.’’

Staff were treated the same as any other member of the public, Foster said.

He would not comment on specifics of the warden’s case, because it was an employment issue.

The case had highlighted a ‘‘technical loophole’’ in the council’s systems, which meant wardens had until midnight on the day they issued a ticket to get into the system to cancel it, he said.

‘‘They will no longer be able to do that.’’

Councillor Paul Eagle said the incident was a ‘‘stark reminder’’ the council was in the public service and ‘‘accountability and transparency are absolutely crucial’’.

The warden wore the council uniform and was an ‘‘ambassador’’ for it, Eagle said. ‘‘This sort of thing is untenable.’’

Council spokesman Clayton Anderson confirmed the ruse was uncovered two weeks ago. All employees were expected to act legally and to comply with the council’s code of conduct.

‘‘We deal with this type of stuff very swiftly. It seems it was just one warden.

‘‘We are really annoyed this has impacted on the integrity of our parking staff,’’ he said.

In 2013, Wellington man Kevin Stroud spent six weeks trying to get an explanation as to why he was given two tickets four minutes apart.

The council eventually waived both tickets as a gesture of goodwill, but that came after a ‘‘bureaucratic runaround’’.

He described the latest debacle as ‘‘pretty appalling’’.

‘‘Given the issues they have had in the past, you would think they would get their systems sorted and foolproof.’’

Retail New Zealand public affairs general manager Greg Harford said retailers relied on available and reasonably priced parking for customers.

‘‘We encourage councils to make sure parking is available for shoppers, and that any parking restrictions are reasonable and enforced fairly.’’

It has not been a good year for those in charge of Wellington parking.

In May, it was revealed wardens were told to issue at least three tickets an hour, which the council defended by saying it had overseen a 44 per cent drop in tickets and the target was a ‘‘performance measure’’.

That same month, a judge successfully appealed against a parking ticket in Blair St, on the grounds the parks were not properly marked.

The council waived the ticket then realised the problem also affected about 50 parks in sections of Allen St, Woodward St, Grey St, Customhouse Quay, Courtenay Place and Cuba St.

They were marked by different coloured paving stones, rather than white lines, in an effort to make the streets more visually appealing.

The council sent contractors to mark out lines instead – but they painted the lines in Allen St too wonky and were sent back to redo them.

Accountability and transparency are absolutely crucial.

Councillor Paul Eagle