Editing Parking meter (section)

===Legality in the United States===
In a 1937 case in Oklahoma,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.oscn.net/applications/oscn/deliverdocument.asp?citeid=18188 |title=OSCN Found Document:Ex parte DUNCAN|publisher=Oscn.net|date=10 December 1936|access-date=12 November 2010}}</ref> H.E. Duncan contended that the ordinances impose a fee for the free use of the streets, which is a right of all citizens of the state granted by state law. The Courts ruled that free use of the streets is not an absolute right. Still, they agreed with an unpublished{{citation needed|date=January 2015}} 1936 Florida court decision that said, "If it had been shown that the streets on which parking meters have been installed under this ordinance are not streets where the traffic is sufficiently heavy to require any parking regulations of this sort, or that the city was making inordinate and unjustified profits using the parking meters, and was resorting to their use not for regulatory purposes but for revenue only, there might have been a different judgment."<ref>[https://casetext.com/case/state-ex-rel-v-mccarthy STATE, EX REL. v. McCARTHY], casetext.com</ref>

One of the first parking meter tickets resulted in the first court challenge to metered parking enforcement. Rev. C.H. North of Oklahoma City's Third Pentecostal Holiness Church had his citation dismissed when he claimed he had gone to a grocery store to get change for the meter.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.inc.com/magazine/20021001/24702.html|title=Inc Magazine, 1 October 2002|publisher=Inc.com|date=1 October 2002|access-date=19 August 2013}}</ref>

The North Carolina Supreme Court judged that a city could not pledge on-street parking meter fee proceeds as security for bonds issued to build off-street parking decks. The court said, "Streets of a municipality are provided for public use. A city board has no valid authority to rent, lease, or let a parking space on the streets be rented by an individual motorist 'for a fee' or to charge a rate or toll. Much less may it lease or let the whole system of on-street parking meters for operation by a private corporation or individual."<ref>Britt v. Wilmington, 236 N.C. 446, 73 S.E.2d 289 (1952)</ref>

{{See also|Chicago Parking Meters}}
A 2009 lawsuit filed by the [[Independent Voters of Illinois-Independent Precinct Organization]] claimed the City of Chicago's 2008 concession agreement for the operation of its parking meters to a private company violated state law.<ref name=IVIIP>{{cite web|title=Independent Voters of Illinois Independent Precinct v. State of Illinois|url=http://www.thenewspaper.com/rlc/docs/2009/il-metersuit.pdf|publisher=Circuit Court of Cook County, IL|access-date=24 January 2011}}</ref> In November 2010, portions of the suit were thrown out by the Cook County Circuit Court, including the claim that the city was using public funds unlawfully to enforce parking regulations after the presiding judge decided that the city retained its ability to write tickets and enforce parking laws.<ref name=NewsCoop>{{cite web|last=Dumke|first=Mick|title=Parking Meter Lawsuit Allowed to Proceed|url=http://www.chicagonewscoop.org/parking-meter-lawsuit-allowed-to-proceed/|publisher=Chicago News Cooperative|access-date=24 January 2011|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101110020610/http://www.chicagonewscoop.org/parking-meter-lawsuit-allowed-to-proceed/|archive-date=10 November 2010}}</ref> However, the judge allowed other parts of the suit to stand, including an accusation that the city unlawfully conceded some of its policing power and its ability to set parking and traffic policy to the private company in the concession agreement.<ref name="NewsCoop"/> As of January 2011,{{update-inline|date=January 2021}} the suit remained active, with the City of Chicago maintaining that the city retains all policing power, maintains responsibility for traffic management, and, through the concession agreement, retains control over rates.<ref name=Letter>{{cite web|last=Saffold, CFO City of Chicago|first=Gene|title=Letter Concerning IVI-IPO Lawsuit|url=http://www.cityofchicago.org/content/dam/city/depts/rev/supp_info/ParkingMeter/IPOSLawSuit.pdf|publisher=City of Chicago|access-date=24 January 2011}}</ref><ref name=AMlaw>{{cite web|last=Baxter|first=Brian|title=Chicago's $1.16 Billion Parking Meter Privatization 'A Watershed Event'|url=http://amlawdaily.typepad.com/amlawdaily/2008/12/chicagos-116-bi.html|publisher=The AM Law Daily|access-date=24 January 2011}}</ref>