New York Renovator
August 4, 2008
Surprised? It’s happening again. A Milwaukee man is facing foreclosure on his $245,000 home because he wouldn’t pay a $50 parking ticket in 2004. In what city officials believe is the first case of its kind, the city foreclosed on Tubic’s house on W. Verona Court after repeated attempts to collect the fine - which over the years had escalated to $2,600 - had failed.
“Our goal isn’t to acquire parcels,” said Jim Klajbor, special deputy city treasurer. “Our goal is to just collect taxes. . . . It is only as a last resort that we would pursue . . . foreclosure.”
I’m sorry Mr. Special Deputy City Treasurer. That might not be your INTENTION, but it certainly was your GOAL, because you DID IT. OK, so the homeowner, a Mr. Tubic, has not paid his parking ticket. How did he get that parking ticket, anyway?
Tubic first got the fine for parking his Ford E150 with no license plates in the driveway of the home, which belonged to his parents at the time. The radiator had broken and Tubic couldn’t get his plates renewed unless the van passed an emissions test. He didn’t have the money to make the repair and had more pressing worries, he said.
His father was suffering from dementia. His mother was battling cancer, and he was their live-in caretaker. He needed to shop, cook, clean, maintain the house and tend to his parents’ needs.
The van repair could wait, he thought.
Then a man from the city showed up and told him otherwise. It was February 2004. Tubic would have to move the van or get license plates for it within 30 days, per city zoning codes, the man said. Somebody had complained.
His van was without license plates and was parked in his driveway?! That’s it?! Where else is he going to park his own van until he fixes it? The city park? So now it’s illegal to park your own vehicle on your own property unless your vehicle meets government “emissions” guidelines and is registered by the government?? Argh!
Tubic is a 62-year old disabled man, on Social Security and “has been diagnosed with psychological disorders that limit his ‘ability to understand, remember and carry out detailed instructions,’ according to documents from the administration.” He has degenerative diseases of the knees and spine, and other ailments. The guy is in poor shape and is an emotional disaster. The poor guy! I really have compassion in him.
HOWEVER– even if the guy was a 250-pound, muscular and wealthy socialite with a Hitler-like moustache, NO ONE’S HOME SHOULD EVER BE CONFISCATED LIKE THIS! It makes me so angry! I don’t want to rehash all the other posts I’ve written about this subject– you can read more about it on my post, How To Create a Serfdom, which is exactly what the government and their fascist corporations are doing to us. These tyrants are just DROOLING, waiting for the moment when they can seize our properties, aren’t they?? Couldn’t they have taken the guy’s CAR, since it was a parking ticket? Couldn’t they have revoked his license, or something? P.S. Tubic did continue to pay his property taxes.
Just remember what Thomas Jefferson said would happen to us if we continue to allow these bullies to keep this up: “If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.” Thomas Jefferson