Busted By JSO in a Parking Lot

I was waiting for someone in a "No Stopping" zone in front of a business when a JSO officer told me to move. I complied with a few words out of earshot, but I also got to thinking that he was over-enforcing the law. This may or may not be true.

Basically, Florida property owners can invite police onto their properties in order to enforce laws that wouldn't normally get enforced on private property. For example, if someone with an expired tag is parking in your mini mall parking lot, you can ask/allow JSO to ticket the vehicle. When parking lot owners were upset about car meetups with dangerous driving, they invited JSO onto the properties, but the violations were probably for trespassing rather than private parking lot speeding.

When I was working at a retail store in college, a raced through the parking lot once in order to get to work on time. A mall security officer drove over to me in order to warn me, and I asked what he or other local police could really do. He told me to just be careful (and he was right). I generally was careful, but I'm pretty sure neither he nor local police had much say as to whether or not I was speeding in the mall lot. Or stopping at the stop sign. 

Florida seems to allow some cooperation between police and property owners, but I'm still not sure it extends to parking lot rules like no stopping zones in front of buildings. To me, that's in the realm of private security asking nicely and then turning to JSO when I refuse to comply, not a heavy-handed police officer deciding he's also a parking lot cop. I mean, if I put a "Chevy Parking Only" sign in my driveway, is this officer going to show up to my house and ticket a friend who parks a Mercedes in the spot? I understand disabled parking spots because there's some kind of federal law about that, but I'm not sure my taxpayer money that goes to JSO is meant to provide officers patrolling in front of Walmart to keep the area clear of old-lady drop offs.

Mostly, it seems that private parking lot enforcement by JSO may take cops away from real crimes, but it's also about playing favorites. Homeless people have started fires behind some private businesses, meaning cops aren't stopping them from basically living there, but apparently other lots have cops enforcing sign that aren't even considered city code? And if the business owner is paying JSO extra for uniformed police to harass folks in a parking lot, I'm not sure that should really be available. He should have been forced to drive a golf cart and wear a uniform with a giant "Z" patch on the side. Keep in mind that I am not suggesting we all rebel against parking lot signs or JSO cops. I complied, and I suggest that if a police officer wants to patrol the local Chick fil a drive-thru, you follow his orders.

Poor Mike F - Pizza Hut Review

Beach and Hodges 

Our closest Pizza Hut was closed. I probably don't want to know why. The next closest store was on Beach near Hodges. The experience was not good, so I'm glad it's not our closest location.

Technically, the experience was much worse for a guy named Mike who was waiting in line before me. Since Mike was kind of a blonde pretty-boy, I don't feel terrible for him, but nobody at that pizza joint really deserved to be mistreated in the way we were.

Mike and three others were in line when I arrived at 6:10. My order pickup time was 6:15, so I was ok with waiting a few minutes. I believe Mike was on the board for 6pm, so his pizza was already late. The cashier eventually took money and delivered pizza to the other two in line, then got to Mike and myself, printing receipts but saying Mike had "literally two seconds" before his pie would be ready. That was at about 6:15, and he was right. The pizza came out of the oven and was placed in the heated waiting spot for Mike a few seconds later by an employee who seemed to have the one job of taunting customers by placing their orders just out of reach. A few minutes later, the cashier left with pizzas to deliver, but he first had to ask the customer who had overly optimistically double-parked him in to move her car. Another ten minutes went by, with the strange guy continuing to add more pizzas to the holding area before the pizza-maker dude came over to man the cash register. He proceeded to give Mike crap about not having a receipt before Mike told him his pizza had been sitting there for 10 minutes and the other guy had already printed his receipt.

Mike finally got his pizza. I was next, and I was lucky the pizza dude decided to give me my pizza without questioning where my receipt had gone (I'm not sure). I'm also not sure how the rest of the line went after I left, since the rest of the line consisted of two butch women who looked very ready to complain and an amputee (who had parked the delivery guy in), also not in a good mood. But I can at least tell you this: Pizza Hut on Beach and Hodges doesn't discriminate against LGBT or minorities or military because everyone gets the same awful service.

Anyhow, the pizza took forever, but it was hot when I got it home, partially because I used the heated seat and kept the AC on low. The problem is that the actual pizza was burned on the outside and a bit doughy in the middle. That means the delivery guy and pizza guy couldn't work the cash register right, but even the weird-Igor-oven-guy couldn't get the pizzas done to the fairly simple standards of being cooked evenly, meaning the entire business was in a shambles. I'm sure everyone hates waiting an extra 20 minutes for their pizzas, but they are willing to forgive if it at least tastes good. While it's possible Mike F's pizzas were cooked properly, I somehow believe he also had a simultaneously undercooked and burned Pizza Hut experience.