Marquette Parking Enforcement not impacted by court ruling

MARQUETTE — Earlier this week, a three–judge panel of the appeals court ruled that it was unconstitutional for a city to mark tires when enforcing parking laws in Michigan, and the ruling may have people wondering how that will change local policies.

But the ruling will not impact the way the City of Marquette enforces their parking laws because they have not used chalk to mark tires in almost 4 years. When it comes to checking for parking infractions, especially in the high traffic areas like downtown, they upgraded to a newer electronic system in early 2016.

“We actually take a photo, within our system, take a photo of their valve stem, and actually time stamps that as well,” said Captain Michael Laurila. “Our enforcement officer is then able to go back and determine if that valve stem moved or didn’t move. I know a lot of questions are going to be asked about the chalking of the vehicles, but we don’t physically do that.”

Captain Laurila also said that the system works well in those high traffic areas downtown, such as the street parking, and parking lots near the commons area and the parking garage.

More information and maps on the parking areas and their restrictions are available at the office of the Marquette Downtown Development Association, as well as at the Police Department.