311 Failures

It is cool when my 311 complaints get results. I feel relevant. Valued.

It sucks a tiny part of my soul into oblivion when my 311 complaints get zero, even counter-productive results.

A few weeks ago I spotted an abandoned car in the general vicinity of Calvary Cemetery. The car had been there for months, maybe more than a year. It has fallen to shreds with its windows bashed out and the car’s hull pillaged for scrap.

This is what makes abandoned vehicles more than just an eyesore. They are magnets for crime creation.

Is this why the NYPD keeps them around?

I remember the first abandoned car I reported. An SUV had been parked on 34th Avenue for months. Windows smashed, tires flat, everything of value had been picked away. Or so I thought. Passing it by for the umpteenth time I spotted a group of kids rummaging through what was left of the vehicle. I don’t know what thought they were looking for but I called 311 again to re-report the abandoned car.

311 put me through to 911, saying that I was reporting a crime in progress and that this was a 911 matter, not 311. If they had simply hauled this car away the weeks or months earlier after I first reported it then this crime would not have been occurring. Does the NYPD consciously let these vehicles molder in anticipation of the crimes they will attract and the arrests they will produce? Does the NYPD actually plant these abandoned vehicles as crime magnets?

I don’t know what came of that above-referenced incident, if the cops caught those kids got in the act and everyone went to jail. But it made me realize that calling 311 can be a dishearteningly pointless waste of time.

Still, I make the effort. I don’t know why, because successes are so rare, but I do.

This time I borked it the first time, submitting the abandoned vehicle report minus important details such as the make & model of the car and the license plate number. In response to this lack of clarity an officer from the 108th precinct actually called me on the phone and left a voicemail to request that I resubmit the complaint with more details. That was impressive, I thought. It seemed like I had the attention of someone in a position to do something about this.

I did what she asked. I resubmitted the complaint with relevant details. I quickly received an automated e-mail reply that seemed to indicate someone would be on it ASAP:

THANK YOU FOR THE DESCRIPTIONS TIRES WIWLL (sic) BE MARKED TONIGHT, IF THE VEHICLE IS STILL THERE AFTER 3/5/16 PLEASE CONTACT 311 WITH THE MAKE MODEL COLOR AND PLATE OF CAR AGAIN AND WE WILL TOW IT THANK YOU

That response seemed incontrovertibly affirmative, until I noticed a puzzlingly contradictory remark contained within the same e-mail:

Your Service Request was closed. This complaint does not fall under the Police Department’s jurisdiction.

I couldn’t tell what was going to happen with this, but after a couple of weeks it seems someone at the precinct decided this was not their problem and that their decision overruled that of the officer who responded to my 311 complaint.

The car remains on that spot today. Curiously it is now missing one of the two license plates present when I reported it. The tires have not been marked and it appears nothing will be done about this until someone more important than this lowly citizen intervenes.

With a little bit of cleaning up this car could be a last-ditch crash pad should I find myself unable to get home from Calvary Cemetery.