Towing Issues: excessive towing fees, dmv web, california dmv

Question
My vehicle was impounded this morning at 2:15am for parking in the fire lane. I contacted the towing company and was told it would cost me $325. today to release my vehicle and that could only be done later in the afternoon because they are closed today, or I could wait until tomorrow and pay $270. to release the my vehicle.  Now when I tried to contact the Santa Clarita, CA police dept to see if these fees were reasonable the officer was very rude and not helpful at all.  How can I find out if these fees are in excess?  And what my rights are if i am unable to pay to have my vehicle released?

Answer
sorry for the delay but its been hectic at work lately..

OK, what I see here is about normal for prices on impounds...

California changed the laws the first part of 2007 to where the rates to be charged are equal to the contracted rates for CHP or local cities (which ever is lower I believe).. That being said, I can not really say that the rates were wrong but they sound about right..

Now the difference in the 2 prices is because of what is called "Gate fee or afterhours release fee"  

That basically is where "if you want the vehicle at times other than normal business hours"  ( monday - friday  8 AM to 5 PM  or real close to those hours) then you pay an additional fee for the person to come in and do the paperwork, collect the money and open the gates... Kind of like overtime...

Now as to the police department being rude, it really is not up to then about the fees charged and I am sure they get lots of calls about towed vehicles... But it really is a CIVIL MATTER and they can not do much about it...

The California DMV web site has lots of information about towing  rules and regulations and is included at the end of this answer..

Now if you can not pay for the vehicle at all, then it will be sold and any fees owned over the sale amount would be your responsibility and they can and usually do to go collection agencies to get paid...

That is also covered on the web site... Just look around it but pay special attention to things dealing with fire lanes, removal from private property (part 22658) and such... That will tell you what can be done...

Good luck and hope this helped

http://www.dmv.ca.gov/pubs/vctop/vc/vc.htm