[malanj]

Officials say these bans aim to prevent nuisances that can be created by those living in cars, and most are enforced only on a complaint basis.

Nothing scares me more than comments like that from government officials. A law that is selectively enforced is effectively an invitation for police harrasment. Either the law makes sense, or it doesn't. If individual civil servants get to decide when to apply a law, you've got a big problem.

[afiler]

Selective enforcement can be a big problem in lots of areas, especially anywhere where race or class come into play.

The flipside is that if people gradually move into parking overnight in industrial areas, and nobody there cares, then homeowners are happy and people saying in their vehicles still have a (perhaps less convenient) place to go. Yet trying to get a rule passed explicitly allowing that in areas zoned industrial would be a lot harder than a rule that sort of evolves on its own.

[jamesaguilar]

There are a lot of restrictions on what you can do that only make sense to enforce when you are actually harming someone else. This is just one example of that principle.

[argc]

While I agree with you, I think it is also a matter of what the police force spends its resources on. There are so many stupid laws that could be enforced, but probably shouldn't. I'd rather the officers ignore the homeless for the most part and spend their efforts responding to 'real crime'. But yes... this definitely could be abused by any one corrupt officer.

[malanj]

If they are stupid but shouldn't be enforced, the place to fix is to have the law removed IMHO. Police judgement shouldn't be the solution to bad laws. It's a band-aid that can cause serious long term damage I think.

[jdmichal]

It's only an invitation for police harassment if you're breaking the law. And in your version, you would instead have been arrested / fined immediately regardless of anyone reporting you.

The bottom line for selective enforcement is that the police recognize that there is a priority structure in laws. They have limited resources and cannot enforce every law, everywhere, every time. While I would rather see this law unmade, the second best thing that can happen is exactly what is, which is the police only getting involved if an actual legitimate issue is raised.

EDIT: A second pertinent example is noise ordinance, which this is similar to as a "public nuisance" law. The law is not worded that it's OK as long as all your neighbors are OK with it. In your world, police would be walking around neighborhoods with a decibel meter and fining every non-compliant house, regardless of whether you cleared everything with your neighbors, or even if your neighbors are the ones making all the noise at your party!

[malanj]

I see this a closer to something like prostitution laws that are selectively enforced in many countries and lead to large scale police corruption/harassment.

Random rant: my limited experience of police treatment of homeless people in San Francisco leaves quite a lot to be desired. I've spent about one month in total there and I saw police hassling homeless people quite frequently. Anything that makes that easier is bad in my mind. Sure - poor people are an "irritation" by some definitions but they remain people even if their existence is inconvenient to some.

[jdmichal]

I agree with your principle whole-heartedly; I was just pointing out that I feel that police harassment is an orthogonal concern, and that selective enforcement is a Good Thing in the vast majority of cases -- ie, all the ones you never hear nor think about.

[mbillie1]

> It's only an invitation for police harassment if you're breaking the law.

Edit: it is often more of an invitation, however, if you are a minority or poor.

[jdmichal]

If they are going to harass you when you're not breaking the law, then the law itself has nothing to do with it. They could equally harass you for any number of things which no one would argue should be criminal. Making a statement about police harassment and abuse of power is fine, but the topic at hand has little to do with that.

[mbillie1]

I suppose my point is that, when a law is selectively enforced, minorities and the poor are the ones who tend to get "selected," which I do think is relevant to selectively enforced laws - they are often enforced in a discriminatory manner.

Edit: I clearly did not explain this with the post above, which upon re-reading makes little to no sense in context here.