Town of Port Hawkesbury staff and councillors will meet with the RCMP to discuss winter parking violations.
Ever since he was elected, Town Councillor Jason Aucoin told last night’s regular monthly meeting of Port Hawkesbury Town Council that he has been asking to have vehicles towed that are parked illegally during snowstorms.
Aucoin said he reached out to a tow operator that expressed interest and contacted town staff a month ago to produce documentation to allow the company to operate but was told recently there’s been no progress on that.
Whenever there’s a snowstorm, Aucoin said he said he sees no less than 12 cars parked illegally, which impacts public safety as well as that of the town’s snowplow operators. In some cases, he said vehicles are parked illegally in front of fire hydrants.
CAO Terry Doyle said the town has a winter parking policy and could enforce illegal parking with a proper bylaw and a bylaw enforcement officer, but under the Motor Vehicle Act which the town must follow like every other municipal unit, Doyle said the RCMP is responsible for enforcement.
Doyle said he did reach out to the tow operator that Aucoin talked about and said the RCMP does not have an issue with that company. He said it is normal for the RCMP to direct a tow company to move a vehicle for an infraction of the Motor Vehicle Act.
But the CAO said tow companies are reluctant to do any “mass movement of vehicles.”
The CAO said he also sought legal advice on this a “number of times” which was unclear, but he promised to seek another legal opinion.
Town Councillor Hughie MacDougall said he will bring this up with the RCMP at the next meeting of the town’s Police Advisory Committee on Jan. 16.
Town councillors approved a motion to have the CAO contact the Port Hawkesbury RCMP and report to council before the committee-of-whole session on Jan. 23.