No bylaw makes city impotent against parking operators

No bylaw makes city impotent against parking operators

Ahmad Junaidi, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The city administration admitted on Tuesday that it could not
punish private parking operators for charging higher parking
rates than the city's official one because of an absence of a
bylaw on parking rates.

Speaking at a hearing with the City Council's Commission D for
development affairs, the chief of the City Parking Agency, Yani
Mulyadi, refused to revoke the operators' permits.

"We have no authority to punish operators who charged a higher
rate. We are afraid we'll lose again if we are sued by the
operators," Yani claimed.

He was responding to the councillors' demand that permits of
the operators, including the largest, PT Secure Parking
Indonesia, be revoked.

Commission D deputy chairman Ali Imron Hussein urged the
administration to take legal action against the private parking
operators.

"If needed we should revoke their permits. It's sad that the
administration is afraid of private companies," Ali of the United
Development Party said.

According to Gubernatorial Decree No. 1698/1999, the parking
rate for a motorcycle is only Rp 500 per hour while for cars it
is Rp 1,000 per hour.

But private parking operators recently increased the rate for
motorcycles to Rp 1,000 per hour and Rp 2,000 per hour with an
additional rate of Rp 1,000 for every hour thereafter.

Two years ago, the city administration closed parking lots,
which were managed by the firms, for charging higher parking
rates.

Dissatisfied with the administration's move, the firms filed
a lawsuit against the administration at the Jakarta
Administrative Court, which ruled that the administration's move
was illegal.

The court said that the gubernatorial decree could not be used
to regulate private parking operators.

In light of this decision, the administration recently
proposed a bylaw on parking rates to the City Council.

Besides regulating parking rates, the bylaw draft would
require private operators to pay a parking tax, which amounts to
about 20 percent of their income, to the city administration.