We sympathise with StrataGuru Struggler (reported by Jimmy Thomson in his article in Domain in the Sydney Morning Herald on 29 January 2013) and the desperate measures that have to be undertaken by frustrated owners faced with cars parked on common property in breach of the by-laws. In our experience, some of those illegal parkers are in fact owners or occupiers in the strata or community scheme itself; but we have seen a number of instances where the illegal parkers have no relationship to the strata or community scheme at all. What generally attracts these people is the proximity of the strata or community scheme to a transport hub, be it train or bus, or the local shopping strip, restaurant, café or pub.
We have long advocated that owners corporations must be empowered to remove or wheel-clamp illegally parked cars. To achieve this requires a very simple amendment to either the Local Government Act 1993 or the Strata Schemes Management Act 1996 (and its counterpart Community Land Management Act 1989) to exempt strata and community schemes from the prohibitions against wheel-clamping and towing of illegally parked vehicles.
We think that there should be some qualification to guard against vexatious abuse of wheel-clamping and tow-away powers. That can be done by requiring the owners corporation to issue at least one warning (which could be done by means of a notice on the windshield or affixed to the driver’s side window) coupled with prominent display of signs warning that cars parked illegally will be wheel-clamped or towed. Then if the vehicle is not removed, or is parked again on the common property, the owners corporation should have the power to wheel clamp and/or have it towed away.
Currently we can achieve part of that by means of a by-law; but only owners and occupiers are bound by the by-laws – visitors are not.
The ability to wheel clamp a vehicle should not be dependent upon whether or not the owner of the vehicle is an owner, occupier or visitor to the strata or community scheme. Any vehicle that is parked illegally on common property should be susceptible to being wheel-clamped or towed.
You’d only have to do it once or twice in a year – the sight of a wheel-clamp affixed to an offending vehicle would not only concentrate the mind of the offending owner but serve as a very clear warning to others.