Garden City, NY Man Threatened By Police Over Washing Car In Own Driveway

Thomas Kreutzer
by Thomas Kreutzer

A Garden City, NY man was visited by law enforcement and threatened with a ticket as he prepared to wash his 1997 Volkswagen in his own driveway.

In the encounter, which was captured on video and posted to You Tube on November 27th, the officer can be seen walking up the driveway to what is obviously a private residence in what appears to be an upper middle class neighborhood and informing at least two men behind the camera that he is responding to a complaint from a neighbor. He states that he is there to warn the men that if they wash the car, they will be in violation of an ordinance which prohibits people from repairing or detailing autos in a public place. When questioned about the ordinance, the officer responds by showing them a Xerox copy of the rule and informing them that they are subject to the law because the area in which they are working is in public view. When the men insist that they are on private property, the officer informs them that if they wash the car in the driveway they will be ticketed.

The Truth About Cars enjoys a good legal discussion and I think there are several elements here that can be seen from different perspectives. In general, people who live in upper class communities don’t like it when their neighbors work on hoopties in their front yards and it makes sense that they would pass an ordinance to prohibit that sort of thing. This officer, who comes off as congenial and professional throughout the encounter, is charged with enforcing those rules and I think he does a good job of explaining the situation to two men who obviously disagree. Of course, thanks to the magic of the internet, you can watch the video and make your own call.


Thomas Kreutzer
Thomas Kreutzer

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  • Don1967 Don1967 on Dec 24, 2013

    Be well, John Spartan, and remember to un-dirt your conveyance in the appropriate location. This smells like a case of using a bad law to get revenge on a bad neighbour. I mean the guy does come off as a bit of a douchebag in his own video. Not saying this justifies an infringement on private property, but in this case there is a sense of Karma about it.

  • Redpoint5 Redpoint5 on Dec 24, 2013

    The officer makes a legal claim that you cannot wash a car in a public place. Obviously, the driveway is not a public place because the owner can legally have the public removed from their driveway. I would have washed the car and told the officer to leave my property, or I would call the police (the real ones that protect the rights and property of the citizens). There are a lot of unverified assumptions in the comments which are incorrect to conclude. Nowhere does the officer say anything about illegally operating a business, and there is no evidence from the video that this was the case. Even if it were an illegal business, it has nothing to do with washing a car on your own property. Ordinances already exist regarding noise levels and time of day. If people don't like the legally produced amounts of noise in their neighborhood, they are free to do any number of things about it. They can purchase double windows, ask the neighbor to quiet down, pay the neighbor to quiet down, or even move to another area. Moving likely won't do anything to improve their happiness though, as complainers are usually determined to be dissatisfied with whatever situation they find themselves in. People looking to be offended will undoubtedly be successful in finding it.

  • DenverMike DenverMike on Dec 25, 2013

    I'd always wash my car at my condo and it was totally banned. But I didn't make a big production of it. Just washed it and gone, 10 minutes max. No one said a word. That's all they're really concerned with. Water running down the street, vacuum going for 30 minutes, doors wide open, floor mats spread out, stereo blasting, tire glaze mess. And who needs a pressure washer?

    • See 2 previous
    • Ect Ect on Dec 25, 2013

      @AlternateReality Soem of the larger condo developments in Toronto have car wash stations in the parking garage. Great in the the winter, for getting the salt spray off the car.

  • Jasper2 Jasper2 on Dec 29, 2013

    Guess the criminals know that the police in G.C. are focusing on car washing since so many banks have been robbed in the past few weeks on Franklin Avenue in that city. Considering the high taxes G.C. residents pay, the fact that they can't wash their cars in front of their very own houses is pure bull. What's next---arrest a church group that does a charity car wash? I would so quickly move the hell out of G.C. and go the freedom of upstate New York. G.C. is way over rated. A traffic nightmare upper middle class city surrounded by ghettos.

    • Jasper2 Jasper2 on Dec 29, 2013

      The first day that it is not freezing in G.C. after January 1, 2014, every G.C. resident with a car should turn their hoses on their cars in their driveways AND every doughnut shop should close. What will the P.D. do then? Call out the National Guard? Declare martial law? Eat frozen doughnuts?

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