Obama Sends Money To Massachusetts For The Restoration Of A Clean Slate

Two weeks before President Elect Obama officially launched his bid for presidency in full-scale earnest; he finally got around to paying the parking tickets he'd accrued in Cambridge and Somerville, Massachusetts during his years of attendance at Harvard Law School. They were seventeen in number, which he received between the years 1988 and 1991, according to Cambridge's Traffic, Parking and Transportation Department. Of the seventeen, Obama only bothered to pay two of them during his time as a student, and he paid both of the two late.

The Massachusetts newspaper, The Globe, began directing questions to local law resources concerning the future president in January of this year. They were simply after dirt, especially any violations of local laws. Around the same time, one of Obama's representatives phoned the parking office in inquiry of the family of tickets, whose youngest member was at least eighteen years old. By the end of the month, the entire sum of $375 in fines had been paid by credit card via Cambridge's city website. Officially, the Traffic, Parking and Transportation Department could not release the name of the resource of the payment. The department's official stance on the matter was that they thought it was great he finally paid, and that they wished others who owed them money would do the same.

Resources who spoke on Obama's behalf - particularly, Jen Psaki - were quick to point out that the fines had been paid from one of Obama's own personal accounts. But none were so quick to respond to the inquiry as to why it had taken so long for Obama to cough up the resources to pay the tickets; they would only keep confirming that he had indeed paid the tickets and late fines in full.

A resource from the Traffic, Parking and Transportation Department informed The Globe that the department's resources showed Obama had received the tickets between October 5, 1988, and January 12, 1990, for violations that included parking in a resident-only area, blocking a bus stop, and failing to replenish resources in money meters. Most of the fines were accrued in the fall of 1988, during the President Elect's first year at Harvard Law School, an infamously taxing year for the students there. Back in those days, a meter violation was a mere $5, though the penalty for not paying turned the fine into $20. There were days in which Obama was awarded more than one ticket because of failure to relocate his car, and continuing to exceed the meter's time limit.

What Obama handed over was essentially $140 in parking fines, and $260 in late fees. The tickets he paid as a student in 1990 were for $10 and $15, respectively. The Globe's resource at the department confirmed that Obama's ticket record was absolutely not uncommon for a Harvard student. However, Obama - who lived in Somerville during his time at Harvard - also owed Somerville $73 in excise taxes, and $45 in late penalties from further parking tickets (one for parking at a bus stop, and the other for parking in a street-sweeping zone).