A NOPA resident recently flagged a situation that perfectly encapsulates San Francisco's approach to enforcement — which is to say, its complete lack thereof. A neighbor has racked up over $3,200 in parking tickets in just three months, been towed three times, and yet the car keeps reappearing on the block, illegally parked, blocking driveways, sitting in red zones, and occasionally just abandoned in the middle of the street. Not a dime paid.

How? Turns out, when your car gets towed in San Francisco, you only need to pay the current tow fee. Outstanding tickets aren't linked to the release. You pay AutoReturn their cut, drive off, and resume your reign of vehicular anarchy.

But it gets better. One SF resident shared a truly staggering case: a neighbor whose SUV parks on the sidewalk nightly — blocking pedestrians, wheelchair users, and strollers — has accumulated 149 citations totaling $23,722. "Wrote to Billal Mahmood's office and MTA, neither helped," the resident said. "What's the point of fines if they just keep doing it?"

Great question. The answer, apparently, is that fines in San Francisco aren't really fines. They're suggestions. The city has built an elaborate system of fee waivers, income-based dismissals, and bureaucratic workarounds that habitual scofflaws have turned into an art form. One-day DMV moving permits designed for smog checks become get-out-of-impound-free cards. The car goes right back on the street.

As one local put it bluntly: "The city should be able to auction off cars like this."

Hard to argue. When the penalty for breaking the law 149 times is... nothing, you don't have a parking enforcement system. You have theater. The city writes the tickets, pats itself on the back for "accountability," and then watches the same car roll back to the same illegal spot.

Meanwhile, every law-abiding driver who feeds the meter or pays a ticket promptly is effectively subsidizing the people who don't. That's not progressive policy — it's a system that punishes compliance and rewards contempt.

At some point, enforcement has to actually enforce something. Boot the car. Auction it. Suspend the registration. Do anything other than printing another citation destined for the glove compartment. Because right now, the only suckers in San Francisco's parking system are the ones playing by the rules.