Scooter startup Bird is suing Beverly Hills after it racked up more than $100,000 in fines from the city's ban
- Bird is suing Beverly Hills, California after the city banned its scooters.
- The company said in the suit that it's paid more than $100,000 in fines to retrieve impounded scooters.
- "Beverly Hills has gone to the extreme," the lawsuit says, and claims the ordinance violates state law.
When the city of Beverly Hills, California approved a ban on "shared mobility devices," or scooters, in August, it quickly began impounding the vehicles throughout the city.
After being hit with "more than $100,000" in fines from 950 citations from the new ordinance, scooter startup Bird has filed a lawsuit against the city, claiming "Beverly Hills has gone to the extreme" and is violating the California vehicle code by banning its scooters within its city limits.
In a complaint filed November 1, Bird said the city council's passage of a six-month ban was a "hasty and deceptive proceeding riddled with violations of California's open-meeting, public participation, and environmental laws." The company also noted how the city has fought tooth and nail to fight against a purple line subway extension, "preferring instead to keep transit riders in communities to the east from reaching Beverly hills."
In their discussions at a special meeting in July, city council members were furious at how Bird and other scooter companies launched without any warning.
"We need to make this as difficult and as punitive as we can," Mayor Julian Gold said at the meeting.
"I am beyond offended by the manner in which this was rolled out. I think it's great technology and maybe it is the right thing, but to intentionally impose on cities the risks that you as organizations have done in an effort to make profit, as far as I'm concerned, is unconscionable."
Bird says many of the reasons cited by city council members are false.
"The city council argued that scooters are 'unregulated," the suit reads, again citing the California vehicle code "This is plainly untrue … if the were unregulated, the solution would be regulation, which was on the agenda for the Special Meeting, but now what the city council actually considered."
There was one dissenter on the city council: Vice Mayor John Mirisch, who said scooters and electric vehicles aren't disruptive on their own.
"What is new is the combination and what is perhaps disruptive is the implementation," he said. "A lot of these accidents that are waiting to happen is because people aren't following the rules of the road - they do exist."
Bird says it has been "irreparably harmed" by the City's "unlawful actions" and requests in its suit that the court award it damages, reimbursement for impound fees, and costs of the lawsuit. A hearing is set for February 2019.