Next winter, Woodbury will enforce no-parking regs during snow storms

HIGHLAND MILLS-The Woodbury Town Board has amended its start parking regulations, requiring residents to remove their vehicles from town roads when it snows. The regulations, adopted by the board at its Feb. 3 meeting, bans parking during snowy or icy weather from Nov. 11 through April 15. It goes into effect November 2005. State and county roads are not included affected. Signs will be posted at each of the seven entrances to the town informing the public of this new law. In many ways, the changes regarding this law are similar to the recent leaf law, which board amended earlier this year. Previous to the leaf removal amendment, the only person who could enforce the local law was Highway Superintendent Pete Stabile. At the Feb. 3 hearing, he cited numerous occasions where plows could not clean streets where cars were parked because the wings on the trucks would have damaged the cars. Unless Stabile was able to personally approve ticketing of any cars in that area, people would begin calling the highway department to complain that their street was not cleaned. According to this new amendment, Stabile would no longer be the only enforcer. Rather, any police officer would be able to write a ticket without other approval. The fines could be anywhere upwards of $250 and considered parking violations. This amount does not include the towing fee which must be paid before any towed vehicle is returned. When asked why the amendment did not simply state that there would be absolutely no street parking between November and January, board members indicated that they were not looking to be stringent. They were merely interested in helping the highway department do its job at the least expense to the community.