{"id":346033,"date":"2026-09-14T04:44:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-14T04:44:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/346033\/"},"modified":"2026-09-14T04:44:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-14T04:44:10","slug":"nypd-refuses-to-release-parking-placard-records","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/346033\/","title":{"rendered":"NYPD Refuses to Release Parking Placard Records"},"content":{"rendered":"

NYPD will not disclose a list of its parking placards<\/a> in response to a routine Freedom of Information Law request, on the grounds that the names of recipients of the parking perk are far too sensitive to reveal.<\/p>\n

The NYPD declined to provide records concerning its roughly 35,000 placards more than a year after Streetsblog submitted a FOIL request for all active NYPD parking permits, including the names of personnel who receive placards. But the department relied on contradictory reasoning for withholding the information, according to a lawyer who filed an appeal on behalf of Streetsblog.<\/p>\n

\t\t\tRecommended<\/p>\n

\t\t
\n \t\"Ten
\n \t\t<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cNYPD has a history of trying to hide records from the public, even though the records belong to the public and the public has a right to access them,\u201d said Michael Linhorst at Cornell Law School\u2019s First Amendment Clinic. \u201cThey haven\u2019t made any argument why releasing this would endanger somebody\u2019s life or safety.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bizarrely, an unnamed FOIL officer at the NYPD denied our seemingly straightforward request by stating it was both too vague to locate the records, and that these same records they supposedly couldn\u2019t find were also exempt from public disclosure:<\/p>\n

Your request does not reasonably describe a record in a manner that would enable a search to be conducted by the New York City Police Department. <\/p>\n

\u2026 The records you requested are exempt from disclosure under FOIL because they would reveal non-routine law enforcement and\/or criminal investigative techniques.<\/p>\n

\u2026 The records you requested are exempt from disclosure under FOIL because if disclosed, they could endanger the life and safety of any person.<\/p>\n

The explanations are contradictory: How can NYPD know the information is sensitive to release if it doesn\u2019t understand what records qualified for the request? <\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t know the records are exempt unless you know what the records are,\u201d Linhorst noted. \u201cThey claim that they can\u2019t even figure out what records you\u2019re looking for.\u201d<\/p>\n

Parking placards have long been<\/a> a key source of flagrant corruption in city, state and federal governments, allowing certain officials to park wherever they want with total impunity.<\/p>\n

The carte-blanche perk encourages unnecessary driving in the nation\u2019s most transit-rich city, enables cops and other officials to obstruct life-saving bike lanes and pedestrian islands, and hinders commerce by blocking loading zones. Placards entrench and symbolize the city\u2019s two-tiered system of traffic laws.<\/p>\n

The NYPD is one of three municipal agencies that issues the permits, along with the Department of Transportation and Department of Education. Street safety advocates have repeatedly urged Mayor Mamdani to rein them in.<\/p>\n

\t\t\tRecommended<\/p>\n

\t\t
\n \t\"AGENDA
\n \t\t<\/a><\/p>\n

Last year, New York\u2019s Finest issued 36,429 such permits, including to its own officers, and state government and federal officials and prosecutors, according to its most recent public reporting<\/a>.<\/p>\n

An anonymous watchdog, who goes by the social media handle Placard Abuse<\/a>, said the police\u2019s FOIL rejection is in line with the department\u2019s larger pattern of acting outside of the law.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe NYPD rejects almost all FOIL requests on outright bogus grounds on their first response as a matter of policy,\u201d Placard Abuse told Streetsblog over email. \u201cAs with placard corruption, there seem to be no consequences when the NYPD deliberately misuses taxpayer resources to systematically violate the law.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\tRecommended<\/p>\n

\t\t
\n \t\"OPINION:
\n \t\t<\/a><\/p>\n

Streetsblog sought the records in question, in part, because parking placards are already very visible: Any New Yorker can see them behind the glass windshields of NYPD vehicles and officers\u2019 private cars. <\/p>\n

Linhorst pointed out that courts have repeatedly ruled that cops can\u2019t shield records concerning common procedures from the public. This includes records about fingerprinting, for example, and should include placards, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cParking placards aren\u2019t this secret technique that the public doesn\u2019t know about,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s hard to imagine how parking placards are non-routine.\u201d<\/p>\n

The threat to security is also highly questionable, the attorney added. He noted that the FOIL officer did not even explain how releasing placard data would hurt anyone. \u201cThey haven\u2019t made any argument why releasing this would endanger somebody\u2019s life or safety,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Linhorst and colleagues at the Cornell Law School clinic appealed the denial on Sept. 4, and the city has until Monday, Sept. 21 to respond. <\/p>\n

The NYPD\u2019s press office declined to comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NYPD will not disclose a list of its parking placards in response to a routine Freedom of Information…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":346034,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[9,24,55,54,56,52479],"class_list":["post-346033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-headlines","tag-new-york-city-news","tag-ny","tag-promoted"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=346033"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346033\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/346034"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=346033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=346033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=346033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}