House bill would scuttle SAFEclear oligopoly
Kristen Mack reports that a House Committee approved a bill today that could throw a monkey wrench into SAFEclear:
A House committee approved a bill today that would ban a central component of Houston's Safe Clear mandatory towing system -- the exclusive contracts designed to keep dozens of wreckers from converging at accident or breakdown scenes.
The bill sponsored by Rep. Robert Talton, R-Pasadena, would allow all wreckers meeting certain requirements to respond to freeway scenes. The Safe Clear program carves the city's freeways into segments served by wrecker companies under exclusive city contract.
The day Kristen Mack goes beyond repeating talking points will be a good day for Houston journalism.
Regarding that bolded section of her first paragraph, that is of course what proponents of SAFEclear have said all along. Of course, that's also what proponents of zone permits for towing said also in the 1990s -- and since we have the zone permits they wanted, presumably that solved the "problem."
However, both the zone permits and the exclusive SAFEclear tow zone permits were designed at least partly (if not wholly) with other ends in mind: revenue enhancement for the city.
That's why later, Mack quotes State Sen. John Whitmire as follows:
"The bottom line is, we ought to leave it alone," Whitmire said. "If you did away with the sections and contracts, you would destroy Safe Clear."
That's most likely true. Initially, Mayor White and Bob Stein came up with a scheme by which the city would make money by selling those exclusive tow zones. Sen. Whitmire forced the mayor to promise that money would be dedicated to SAFEclear/mobility by threatening to scuttle the whole scheme. If Talton's bill goes through, there will be no revenues coming as a result of the oligopolistic zones White and Stein created, and SAFEclear will have to be scuttled, or funded differently.
Mack discusses other interesting provisions of Talton's bill in her coverage.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/07/05 10:59 PM | Print |
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