Cindy Pace of Observatory Hill has a problem with a summons she received in the mail for a 4-month-old parking ticket.

"I never got that ticket," she said.

	Darrell Sapp/Post-Gazette
	Cindy Pace stands on her porch, overlooking her 1997 four-door Ford Escort, for which she received a summons in the mail for a four-month-old parking ticket she never saw. (Darrell Sapp, Post-Gazette)

The $11 ticket was written at 12:02 p.m. Thursday, April 10, for parking at an expired meter in the 3900 block of Perrysville Avenue. Because the ticket hadn't been paid, $29 in court costs was added. An $11 ticket had more than tripled in price.

The summons said the ticket was issued to the registered owner of a Ford with Pace's license plate.

"That's my car," she said, referring to the purple 1997 four-door Escort with 128,000 miles on it. She said she is the only one who drives it.

Pace, 47, who works at Home Depot in Ohio Township, was straightforward about the three parking tickets she has received in the past five years.

She was tagged Downtown and in Oakland "for parking in the wrong place at the wrong time." She found both tickets under the windshield wiper on the driver's side when she returned to her car.

A parking enforcement officer handed her the third ticket for parking in a street sweeping zone even though the street sweeper never appeared that day. She now knows you can get a ticket for parking on the side of a street set aside for sweeping on a particular day whether or not the sweeper shows up.

"I paid all those tickets," she said. "I realize the city is in a financial pinch, but I am in no position financially to hand over $40."

She wondered if the ticket had blown away or been taken off her car by someone.

The answer to both questions is yes, said William Simmons, chief administrator of Municipal Court.

"Tickets can blow off, especially if they aren't secured properly," he said.

And April 10 was a windy day. The National Weather Service clocked winds at 23 mph that day.

"Tickets also get taken off cars, especially in Oakland," Simmons said. "We suspect it's pranksters."

Simmons said parking tickets also have been removed by people who put them under the windshield wipers of their illegally parked cars in an attempt to avoid a ticket. Ticket thieves should be advised that parking enforcement officers and city police officers are on to this fraudulent switcharoo scenario and take a dim view of it.

"It is a futile exercise for people to steal tickets and put them on their own cars," said Ralph Horgan, executive director of the Pittsburgh Parking Authority. "The tickets are computer coded and officers will write multiple tickets for an illegally parked car when circumstances warrant."

Pace wanted to know the best course of action when you get a summons for a parking ticket you never saw.

Go to Traffic Court and tell it to the judge, Simmons said.

Traffic Court is open from 8:30 a.m. to 11:45 a.m. Monday through Friday and from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Monday and Wednesday. First come, first served.

Horgan agreed.

"It is unfortunate that tickets sometimes get blown away or taken," he said. "Although it may be inconvenient to come Downtown to Traffic Court, it is a way for people to explain their situation."

Horgan said there are 35 parking enforcement officers. Last year they wrote about 315,000 tickets with a total value of $6.2 million. None of that money goes to the parking authority. Horgan said city police officers wrote between 20,000 and 25,000 parking tickets last year.

Fines range from $11 for parking at an expired meter to $220 for parking in a handicapped parking space without the necessary license or permit on display.

And, barring high winds and ticket thieves, if there's a ticket on your windshield, you deserved it.