Unexpected Consequences Of Titling A Vehicle In A Company Name; You Can Fight City Hall Only If You Get A Lawyer

A recent news story from Chicago highlights a no doubt unintended, but certainly no less real, consequence of titling company vehicles in the name of the company. In this instance, an individual had organized her photography business as a limited liability company and had titled the vehicle she used in her business in the name of the company. Certainly nothing wrong with that. While on the job, she received a clearly erroneous parking ticket; she had actual evidence showing that the meter was valid at the time the ticket was issued. Not that, ultimately, it would matter.

In reliance upon Stone Street Partners LLC v. City of Chicago Department of Administrative Hearings, 2014 Il. App. (1st) 123654, 12 N.E.3d 691 (May 20, 2014), the Chicago Department of Administrative Hearings, the body to whom parking tickets are appealed, threw out the appeal on the basis that the vehicle was owned by a business organization (whether a corporation or an LLC is not entirely clear, not that the distinction would in this instance matter) and must, in any proceeding, be represented by an attorney. Hence, the individual sole owner of the business organization could not, on its behalf, appeal a parking ticket.

HERE IS A LINK to that news story.

There is Kentucky law providing that only an attorney must represent an LLC; in the Bobbett decision the pleadings filed on...