Houston putting vehicles in jail, making money

HOUSTON — The borough’s smallest police department now has something its larger cousins lack — its own impound lot.

Houston Mayor Roger Purcell said that for about the last four months his police department has been impounding vehicles to a pair of city-owned impound lots near city hall. As of Monday, he said, there were more than a dozen cars in the lot, waiting for their owners to bail them out.

Since the city does its own impounding, it also collects its own impounding fees, Purcell said, which generates revenue that in turn helps pay for the city’s budding police department.

“Why would you bring in revenue from the property owners and the taxpayers rather than the ones that are breaking the law?” he said.

Like other departments, he said, Houston will let a friend take a car home if its driver is going to jail.

“If they have somebody close by we’ll do that. But in most cases when they say that they’re like, ‘Oh we’re an hour away,’” Purcell said.

In addition to the impound fees now coming into the city, Purcell said having an impound lot allows the city to be tougher on scofflaws.

Purcell said that people with more than $1,000 of unpaid fines or tickets will see their cars locked up until the fines are paid.

“We have a bunch of them that owe the city over $1,000,” Purcell said, estimating scofflaws probably owe the city more than $100,000 total.

He said unclaimed vehicles are held for 30 days, then a notice goes out to the owner, then the owner has 20 days to pick it up. After that it’s auctioned off.

Greg Wood, deputy chief with the Wasilla Police Department, said his department is one that contracts to an impound yard.

If a car is impounded as part of an investigation or in order to be searched, Wasilla sends it to Matanuska Towing and Recovery, which has a contract with the city.

If a driver is going to jail and nobody can pick up the car, however, the city calls whatever tow truck operator is next on its list.

“We have folks on a rotating basis. We just go with the next available and dispatch has a list and they just chose whatever’s next available,” Wood said.

Wherever the car goes, Wood said, when it’s all said and done the city doesn’t get a cut of whatever impound fees are paid.

Houston has a similar system — it contracts with a wrecker to tow cars to the city’s lot.

“I’m surprised how cheap he does it for,” Purcell said. “It’s only $75 is what he charges us for it.”

Purcell said that larger jurisdictions like Anchorage and Fairbanks impound cars.

“I think we have it out here because we actually have the room and the ability to do it here,” Purcell said.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.