http://www.wqad.com/Global/story.asp?S=4356540&nav=1sW7

Overnight parking ordinance lights up protest in Pekin

PEKIN, Ill. A Pekin man is trying to turn out the lights on a law that requires cars parked overnight along city streets to be lit up.

Two ten dollar tickets inspired Daniel DeHoog to organize a Sunday meeting to protest a long-standing ordinance that requires cars parked along any city street be lighted from one to four a-m.

DeHoog calls the ordinance silly and an embarrassment to Pekin.

City officials say the ordinance keeps streets clear for emergency vehicles and curbs car burglaries, vandalism and four-wheeled clutter in this city of nearly 34-thousand people.

Officials say most on-street parkers put flashing lights inside their cars rather than draining car batteries by using parking lights.

Police issued up to four-thousand tickets a year from 2000 to 2004 under the law.