The Department of Correction bussed up (again) when its drivers got caught by this paper (again) hogging public parking spaces in Downtown (again) — but this time, agency officials promise (again) that they’re fixing the mess with a few new rules for their drivers.
After our reporters repeatedly caught drivers from the Brooklyn House of Detention filling up spaces on Court Street near the Atlantic Avenue lockup, a department official told us it “won’t happen again.”
But it did. So we called the agency again. And this time, a Department of Correction official said that the agency has devised new rules for the drivers.
So now, the bus drivers — who take inmates from Rikers Island to Brooklyn courts in Downtown and back again every day — are only allowed to use public parking spaces on Court Street for 45 minutes on their lunch breaks.
“Drivers with a longer wait before their return trip [to Rikers] have been instructed that they may not park in this congested area for extended periods,” said Correction Department spokesman Steve Morello in an e-mail. “Their longer-term parking must be in three designated less-busy areas of Brooklyn.”
He wouldn’t elaborate on the “less-busy” areas, but did say that his supervisor would be giving “extra emphasis to enforcement” of the new policy.
All the bus fuss began in April, when we fielded complaints about the hulking vehicles parking on Court and Schermerhorn streets, back to back, in congested Downtown. Morello told us that it would never happen again, and the buses left Court Street — for Adams and Jay streets.
So this week’s bus on Court Street is apparently kosher. But next time, we’ll have our timer.
