Many years ago I worked for one of Greensboro's rotation towing companies. For those who don't know, a rotation towing company is one of several companies contracted with the Greensboro Police Department to provide 24/7/365 towing services anywhere inside the city limits and occasionally beyond.
If you wreck your car and don't request a particular towing company the responding officer will ask 911 dispatch to send the next available rotation wrecker. Same goes if your car breaks down in the middle of a busy street and a GPD officer responds and is unable to clear the street without a tow truck. It's a system that's used by most police departments and law enforcement agencies across the nation.
Another job quite common to rotation towing companies is the towing of illegally parked cars. Contrary to popular opinion and what you see in the movies, tow truck drivers do not ride around looking for illegally parked cars to tow. At least not in North Carolina. To do so would be grand theft auto and a very good way to get one's self shot. In North Carolina, tow truck operators wait until they are called by the proper authorities before they hook.
Every year along about the time the local universities begin their fall classes the business of towing illegally parked cars heats up. Local police departments and campus police break in new college freshmen by introducing them to the consequences of no parking where you're supposed to park.
I'm not saying it's a good thing and it's rarely pretty, that's just the way it is.
Sometimes I felt sorry for them. On a couple of occasions I even paid their tow bills when I really believed they didn't know or really believed the hardship was more than they could bear. Believe me, with child support and no more than what tow truck operators make paying a stranger's tow bill was a pretty big hit in the wallet. I also witnessed many Greensboro police officers let them go without towing their cars so don't tell me cops don't have hearts too.
Other times I felt no sympathy what-so-ever. Like when a half dozen or more UNCG students would park their cars bumpers touching, thinking we would never be able to get them out. It wasn't easy but we got them out every time. And all that extra work jacked up the bill. To them it had become a game. You play, you pay. And I never lost a tow.
No, I won't tell you how we got them out-- trade secrets are meant to be kept. Besides, I've still got friends in the towing business and don't want to make their already hard lives even harder.
I remember one young man near UNCG who claimed that Congressman Howard Coble was his uncle and that both myself and the police officer who had called me to tow the car would lose our jobs if his car got towed. Jerry, the Greensboro Police Officer who was having me hook to the car smiled and said, "I was about to let you slide... Until you threatened our jobs. Billy, tow the car."
Was he related to the Congressman? I don't know. But I do know I didn't get fired and Jerry retired.
On another day near UNCG while I was hooking to a car for Jerry, a young lady parked in front of a fire hydrant directly across the street from us. There was a sign clearly marking the space as a no parking zone. As the young woman got out of the car Jerry politely said to her, "Ma'am, it's against the law to park where you're parking."
The young woman look at Jerry, a Greensboro Police Officer in uniform, ticket book in hand, said a few choice words I'll not print here and gave Jerry and I the 1 finger salute. Then she calmly walked out of sight.
"Hell no," Jerry mumbled, "Hell no!" I thought he was mad enough to shoot her. "Billy, put down that car and take her car instead. I will not tolerate anybody treating me like that even if I am just 2 months from retirement."
She was one mad... Well, she was really mad when she came to pick up her car-- acted like it was somebody else's fault and not her own. She even tried to blame me but I was only doing what I was told to do by the very angry man with the shiny badge and the very big .357 Magnum gun. What was I going to tell him? No?
We noticed trends too. At NC A&T we towed a car for illegal parking just one time. After which the student, usually with parents in tow, would show up to pay the bill. And you can bet his or her parents would be giving the student down the road about how they had better shape up or else. I remember man an African-American parent telling his or her child, if you're smart enough to get into college you are smart enough to read a no parking sign. Rarely, if ever, did we tow a car belonging to any A&T student a second time and never did we tow that same car a third time. I don't know how it is today but in those days, A&T parents kicked ass and took names.
And folks, just to keep it all in perspective, if you've never red this blog before, your reading the words of an old white dude from east Greensboro.
Over at UNCG things were completely different. We towed the same students so often that we knew them almost as well as we knew our own kids who were in high school at the time. We recognized the cars before we hooked them, even told their friends to tell them which towing company had their car. Almost never did a parent come with then to pick up a car. And remember: there were 5 rotation wrecker companies, the smallest with 5 trucks, splitting this business at the time. These kids were getting towed multiple times per week-- many of them because they were too lazy to walk from one class to the next. Granted, these kids didn't represent all the kids at UNCG but these behaviors were far more common at UNCG that at A&T. We were in-fact dealing with only a handful of the 10,000 or so students on campus there-- the handful who felt themselves entitled because of their families' money and power.
And remember: a lot of these kids lived on campus and had no need to drive anywhere during the normal class day.
I mean, sure, it's a long ways across campus at UNCG but all of these students were healthy 18 and 19 year old freshmen and sophomores who felt they were entitled to park anywhere they liked as long as mommy and daddy continued to foot the bill. After all, unlike the kids at NC A&T, these kids, not all, but these particular kids at UNCG were among the 'haves'.
The other day I read about how UNCG Chancellor Linda Brady is spending $91 million on a student recreation center. Like the Greensboro Performing Arts Center, the 'haves' believe they are entitled to it.
