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20 www.canadianlawyermag.com/inhouse BETTER CUSTOMER service. Better compli- ance. Cheaper operating costs. More detailed information available. It's rare for initia- tives to have no down sides at all, but that's exactly what can be said about the City of Toronto's efforts to put its parking ticket payment system online. The old way of disputing parking tickets was time-intensive and cumbersome. Motorists had to request trials and appear in person before a justice of the peace to dispute the charges. Offices were only open during regular working business hours, making it difficult for those who couldn't take time off work to ask questions of city employees or gather additional information about the process. The courts were clogged as disputed tickets rose to 10.6 per cent in 2015 from three per cent in 2004. Wait times to get a disputed ticket situation resolved could take up to 18 months. The system just wasn't working, and the city had to withdraw more than 800,000 tickets in September 2015. A new solution had to be found, and it was up to the legal services division to take on that task. With the issues it was having, the city enacted By-Law No. 799-2017, which created an adminis- trative penalty system for parking, standing and stopping violations. Given that the city now had the means to manage enforcement, it seemed time to take a different approach and modernize the way tickets were handled. We wanted to see if we could blow that [old] model up and see if we could improve things for the public," says Kalli Chapman, director of prosecution. "We wanted to make it more accessible to the public and to leverage technology, because nowadays, most people run most of their lives off of a cellphone or off their laptop or computer. We felt that it was necessary to open up our minds to other opportunities to better serve the public, and allow them to openly dispute their matters with the city in terms of parking violations." Under the new system, in-person options aren't taken away, but motorists can pay their tickets online or launch disputes. In order to make their cases, drivers can upload photos and other materials. A screening officer can evaluate the dispute and cancel, confirm or vary the penalty, but the officer's decision can be reviewed by a hearing officer who is a member of an independent adjudicative body known as the Administrative Penalty Tribunal. Failure to pay a fine triggers a plate denial at the Ontario Ministry of Transportation, preventing motorists from renewing their licence plates. If the city already has a driver's email address (from previous interactions), the ticket can even be served through email, a solution for those situations where motorists drive away before the parking enforcement officer can finish writing and issuing the ticket. Additionally, parking enforcement officers received new handheld computers that can take pictures of the violation and geotag the location where it occurred. As part of the project, which was completed in Moving parking enforcement into the online world Under the new system, motorists can pay tickets or launch disputes online and upload photos INNOVATIO Wendy Walberg, City Solicitor. Kalli Chapman, Director, Prosecutions Section CATEGORY: Legal operations /Innovation of the Year DEPARTMENT SIZE: Large COMPANY: City of Toronto