Baby Don'tcha Go, Don'tcha Go to New Haven

Few petty annoyances chap my hide more than greed-crazed parking cops, and the cities addicted to their ill-gotten booty. Now I see these monsters have an insidious new tool:

A few weeks ago, New Haven resident Cara Norman found her son's car being towed from outside her Connecticut home. The reason stunned her. It turns out she owed $37 in back taxes. […]

[I]n a small but growing number of cities, vehicle tax and parking ticket deadbeats are being nailed by the taxman's new high-tech tool.

"We like it," says Moses Cortez of the Arlington Treasurer's Office in Virginia. "It makes our job a lot easier."

It looks like a radar gun, but it's actually an infrared scanner that reads license plate numbers and then runs them against a computer database of tax and ticket delinquents. If there's a match, it locks in. […]

On a recent outing through the streets of Arlington, it only took seven minutes to hit pay dirt. The car was stripped of its plates, booted or towed until the owner pays up.

Arlington County Treasurer Frank O'Leary says it's a cash cow.

"It sure is and we're going to keep doing it," he says. "The cars just jump right out and say, 'Here I am, come and get me.'"

Arlington is reeling in $2,800 of lost revenue a day, already more than paying for the gadget, which cost $2,700.

More here and here; thanks to reader John Gould for the tip.