Parking Meters

Years ago, when my Dad first started working in downtown Houston, I remember riding into work with him one day and him handing me a dime to put in the parking meter. "Be sure to turn the knob all the way back". he told me. I believe I was around 6 years old at the time. That was one of my favorite days with my dad, just me and him, my Mom and brothers were off on other errands. I seem to recall he was off from work that day but he needed to pick up some papers from his office to take home and work on. He picked up his papers and then took me to a little diner on main street that served these huge, whatever you want breakfast platters on the cheap. That was a great day out with my Dad and it was my first experience ever with a parking meter. Years later when I started a job in downtown Houston, many of these same parking meters were still in existence. But then, newer parking meters were added and numbers were painted on public parking spaces and now patrons were required to punch in the number of the slot they were parked in. These meters ran on 12 volt batteries that required a manual recharging and were often out of order. Just a couple of years ago Mayor Bill White of Houston made an attempt to recap all of these lost Parking revenues and had solar powered meters installed throughout the city of Houston. These meters are not only solar powered but also take credit cards and are wifi enabled. You simply follow the instructions, pay the money required and then place the receipt on the dashboard of your car. The date and time and amount of parking time purchased is all listed on that receipt.
So, what is the problem with this, you may ask? Oh, there are a lot of problems, the first being that a lot of the solar powered meters end up losing their charges, due to cloudy skies, trees or whatever, and the public does not understand that they can proceed to any working meter nearby and get a receipt to place on the dash of their car. The biggest problem with these style of parking meters though, is the publics refusal to even try to learn how to work them. Day end, and day out, I see people walk up, look at the meter and immediately start looking around for someone to help them work the meter. They never even try to read the instructions , they just float right into helpless mode. The first instruction on these meters are "Press Any Button To Start" Most don't even read that far, they just immediately turn away and search for someone to do it for them. I have done the demographics and the majority of these people are Black or Brown. I am not being racist, just stating the fact that the majority of people who can not follow the directions and want someone else to help them out, are from these groups. These people don't even make an attempt to figure out something as simple as a parking meter, so how can they make an informed opinion or make an informed vote? The state of our Union Right now scares me. We have too many people who would rather choose a color than a principal, It's not about the color, It's about America and Americans. It's about our freedoms and our rights. It's about being an American and supporting our country and the principals our country was founded on. GOD BLESS AMERICA