From Tech Transfer Newsletter, Summer 2000 » printer-friendly

Implementing a "Winning" Vehicle Impound Program

By Ted Chira-Chavala and Douglas Cooper

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's statistics, 11 percent of all drivers involved in fatal crashes had suspended or no licenses. There is ample evidence that license suspensions or revocations alone do not prevent disqualified drivers from driving. In January 1995, California enacted the vehicle impound law, which allows a police officer to cite a disqualified and unlicensed drivers, and to impound the vehicle for 30 days. An impounded vehicle can be released after 30 days when the registered owner (or agent) presents a valid driver's license and proof of vehicle registration, or upon a court order. The registered owner must pay all towing, storage, and administrative fees when redeeming the vehicle. California law fully intends that cities can recover all expenses associated with impounding vehicles.

Setting Up a Vehicle Impound Program In California, driving without a valid license is a secondary enforcement; therefore a driver must be stopped for some other infraction before his/her license can be checked. The following is a model that may be followed for setting up a vehicle impound program.

1. After a vehicle is pulled over for some infraction, the police officer calls a dispatcher who logs the stop and then runs a license check.
2. If the driver has no proper license, the dispatcher calls a tow truck. The police officer gives the driver a traffic citation for driving without a proper license then takes an inventory of the vehicle's contents, inspects the vehicle for damage, and completes a tow form.
3. The officer stays with the vehicle until the tow truck arrives, and then accompanies the truck to a tow lot. Officers may be advised to ask drivers to leave after being cited to reduce contact time between the officer and driver.
4. The officer turns in the completed tow form and vehicle key to a Records Clerk at the police station, who enters the information in a tow database.
5. The Records Clerk mails out a notification to the registered owner within two working days of impoundment, as required by law. Failure to do so will prohibit the police department from charging the vehicle owner for more than 15 days of impoundment when the owner redeems the vehicle.
6. The law allows the vehicle owner to request a hearing. To do this, the owner contacts the Records Clerk, who schedules a hearing and collects the hearing fee. The law requires the hearing to be held within 48 hours of the request, excluding weekends and holidays.
7. On the day of the hearing, a police officer is assigned to review documents and conduct the hearing (it usually takes 15-20 minutes) to determine whether or not the towing was legitimate. If it was not, the vehicle is released to the owner at no cost, and the hearing fee is refunded.
8. If the vehicle was deemed legitimately towed, it can be released to the owner after 30 days, with proof of vehicle registration and proper driver license. At that time, the Records Clerk completes the release form and collects all fees from the owner.
9. A clerk accompanies the owner to the tow lot where the vehicle is released.
10. If a vehicle is not claimed after 30 days, it is eligible for lien sale. In this case, the Records Clerk takes the vehicle title and notifies potential buyers. Once a buyer is found, an outside person or entity can be hired to process paperwork related to the lien sale.

Structure and Level of Fees

Total fees collected from the vehicle owner include towing, storage, tow hearing, release, and lien sale processing. Here are some examples of fees to assist in determining the level of charges that would reasonable to offset the costs of running a self-supporting program:

Resource Requirements for Vehicle Impound Program

A successful vehicle impound program requires careful planning of personnel, physical, and financial resources from the outset, so that other police activities within the city will not be adversely affected. Key resources required for operating a vehicle impound program are highlighted below.

Personnel

The following personnel and their time are required. The values shown below may be used for planning purposes:

For impounding vehicles:

For tow hearings:

For releasing vehicles:

For vehicle lien sale:

Training of Personnel

Because a vehicle impound operation involves a wide range of personnel to perform tasks, training is essential. Drivers who have just learned that they are about to temporarily lose their vehicles may react very strongly (certainly more strongly than those just receiving traffic citations). The police officer, having to wait for a tow truck to arrive, could be in contact with the driver for a long time. Clerical staff may also face irate "walk-in" citizens asking for information and/or solutions pertaining to an impounded vehicle. Training should cover pertinent sections of the vehicle code, vehicle impound procedure, and record keeping requirements, as well as how to deal with citizens and grievances (both on the road and at the police station), conflict resolution, and personal safety. Specific areas that might be covered include: how to conduct and achieve "zero tolerance";impound enforcement; pertinent legal aspects and departmental procedures; how to effectively interact with "walk-in" citizens; address questions or grievances and avoid or resolve potential conflicts (asking for assistance when conflicts escalate is important).

Infrastructure and Equipment

A tow lot is essential for a vehicle impound operation and it must have adequate storage capacity and good security. The latter usually calls for fences, lighting, and security cameras (and/or guards). In addition, when a tow lot is located in a residential neighborhood, measures to minimize dust and noise generated by the tow lot may also be required.

A vehicle impound database needs to be developed by the police department. Various forms are also needed for processing and tracking impounded vehicles, including tow forms, tow-hearing request forms, vehicle release forms, and lien sale forms. Bullet-resistant partitions may be considered to protect the clerk from an angry citizen.

Demonstrable Benefits of the Vehicle Impound Program

ITS researchers studied the effects of a vehicle impound program in the city of Upland, California, a community with a population of 68,000 in San Bernardino County. This program has been in operation since 1995. The Upland program was based on a "zero tolerance" impound policy. The researchers found that the number of impounded vehicles in Upland grew significantly from about 20 vehicles per month initially to about 130 vehicles per month at the peak. A critical analysis of crash and citation/arrest data, police enforcement activities, police enforcement resources, and financial data for Upland, revealed both safety and financial benefits.

Safety Benefits

Analysis of the Upland experience suggests that it is the long-term and continuous nature of an impound program that yields the safety benefits. Secondly, a vehicle impound program should not be implemented in isolation, or in place of other police enforcement activities. Rather, it should be a part of overall police enforcement activity.

The researchers found considerable positive synergies among all enforcement activities, which resulted in reductions in some crash types as well as a reduction in the amount of driving by disqualified drivers. This benefit however became evident only about 2 to 2.5 years after the program was implemented. DUI offenses were reduced as well as the number of fatal plus injury crashes, hit-and-run crashes, and speeding related crashes. The program did not appear to affect other unsafe behaviors such as speeding, misdemeanor crimes, or felony crimes, which were instead found to be more responsive to overall police enforcement efforts.

Financial Impact

Upland's vehicle impound program is financially self-supporting. Annual revenues from impound fees total about $700,000. In fact, analysis of revenues, fees, and the number of impounded vehicles for Upland indicates that revenues can easily exceed operating costs (including estimated wages and lost ticket revenues due to police officers conducting vehicle impound enforcement instead of writing traffic tickets). Upland's vehicle release fees go into a "traffic offender fund," which was retained by the Police Department to continue operating the vehicle impound program. The balance of the revenues (minus tow and lien sale processing fees, which are "pass through" fees) go directly into the city's general funds. Upland used an existing tow lot with s 200-vehicle capacity located next to the police station to store impounded vehicles.

The Importance of Public Relations

A vehicle impound program is most likely to make a positive impact on safety if it has:

• continuous and long-term operation;
• a "zero tolerance" impound policy, and
• sufficiently severe penalties (i.e., loss of vehicle for 30 days or more and large fees to redeem the vehicle).

These three features collectively tell the public that the police department is seriously committed to enforcing vehicle impound law.

Even a well-conceived vehicle impound program will benefit from a publicity campaign to get the word out to drivers that the police are very serious in regard to enforcement. This should include local news coverage with regular follow-ups; flyers; information displays at strategic locations; handing out information at checkpoints; community meetings; etc.

The study of Upland's impound program Safety and Other Impacts of Vehicle Impound Enforcement, by Douglas Cooper,T. Chira-Chavala, and David Gillen, UCB-ITS-RR-2000-1, February 2000 is available from the ITS Library and online at: UCB/2000/RR/UCB-ITS-RR-2000-1.pdf