Lifetime Citizen Portal Access — AI Briefings, Alerts & Unlimited Follows
Resident accuses Bethlehem Parking Authority of misconduct; council schedules follow‑up review
Loading...
Summary
A resident told council he received an unlawful parking ticket tied to kiosk software failures and said a magistrate found him not guilty; Councilman Callahan asked for a committee‑level review of the Parking Authority’s procurement, transparency and handling of citizen requests.
A Bethlehem resident told City Council that the Bethlehem Parking Authority (BPA) wrongly issued and then defended a parking ticket after parking‑payment kiosks failed to accept his payment. Robert Drechsinger said he and his wife paid at SteelStacks but later could not pay at on‑street kiosks and received ticket no. 396685 on Aug. 8, 2025; he said he disputed the ticket online and lost at first, but at a magistrate hearing presented evidence including screenshots and said a BPA representative admitted a third‑party kiosk software "glitch." Drechsinger said a judge found him not guilty and admonished BPA for inflating the fine on the summons from $30 to $65.
Drechsinger named BPA staff and board members (Garcia, Wells and Fernstrom in his remarks) and asked for a promised face‑to‑face meeting with the mayor and an opportunity to share his exhibits. "The unlawful ticket should have been dismissed way back on August 12 when it was originally disputed," Drechsinger said; he urged greater transparency and accountability from the parking authority.
City officials responded that the parking authority liaison and staff would meet with Drechsinger after the meeting and that he could forward exhibits to the city clerk’s office. Councilman Callahan later asked the council to schedule a committee‑of‑the‑whole meeting to examine multiple issues involving the parking authority, citing citizen complaints, procurement questions about the Walnut Street garage sprinkler piping and what he described as unresponsiveness to records requests. "My whole thing is just make sure that the city of Bethlehem...got exactly what we paid for," Callahan said, urging the administration and the parking authority to provide documentation.
Mayor’s office and council members said the parking authority operates as a separate municipal authority under state law and that certain governance and debt structures complicate dissolving or folding it back into city operations; council members nonetheless agreed to pursue a public, committee‑level review of the authority’s practices.
Provenance: Drechsinger’s comments begin at SEG 050 and the council discussion of the parking authority and Callahan’s committee request appear from SEG 1396 to SEG 1775.
