Towing Issues: Towing, small claims court, fire lane

Question
I was towed from directly in front of my house in San Diego, CA.  There is a "no parking, fire lane" sign that I have never seen enforced, but, apparently, the HOA has an agreement with Western Towing to allow them to patrol and tow cars if in fire line.  First question, is this kind of patrolling legal?

Second, I have read the link to the DMV website (thank you very much).  My questions are how do I go about (1) finding out if the tow company has an agreement with local jurisdiction police to tow more than 10 miles (2) is the towing company supposed to provide signage with the phone # (3) are they required to attempt to knock on the door to let me know they are towing (4) any guidelines around after hours access (is up to 4 hours wait time standard)?

If I go to small claims court and the two company, for example, wrote down the wrong color of the car on the paperwork, would they throw out the case due to a technicality?

Thanks!


Answer
Yes  "fire lane towing" is still legal in California...

as to the legal part of it, well I am not sure about waivers on the distance but I know that they can get them... Hard to say where they  would record that information, and if I remember there was some discussion when that part of the rules where made as to air miles or drive miles...

Signs well fire lane sign rules are different from standard parking signs and that is always a problem with tows of that nature...

Knocking on doors, well that should of been the job of the management if they did not want vehicles parked in the fire lanes, but they chose to have the enforcement done by a tow company... Now if you were not "directly in front of your door" but 2 doors down how far can or should they go trying to track down someone?

The afterhours fee, well they do I believe have a 1 hour window to get there, but I might be wrong... Yes that is spelled out in the California laws.

Now in court, well that problem with the color is just not a big deal...  I call some cars blue or green and have been told it is Teal or some such color... Red is nice but what color is wine ?

If you go to court good luck, but have all your ducks in a row and have lots of documentation... Remember you have to prove to the judge your case and have him agree with your evidence and reasoning.