Colorado Springs police have a new tactic against street racers and other criminally bad drivers: taking the cars.

The Police Department alongside the City Attorney’s Office announced the city’s first three seizures of vehicles Tuesday, using a new ordinance they say will help get reckless and unsafe drivers off the roads and hold them accountable.

The Vehicle Public Nuisance Ordinance empowers police to identify vehicles engaging in repetitive reckless behavior that falls into one, or up to six outlined categories: eluding, attempting to elude; prostitution; street racing; drive-by shooting; and gang-related activity.

“We work with the municipal court, file an action to have the vehicle itself declared a public nuisance,” said Shantel Withrow, the division chief for the city attorney’s Prosecutions Office. “Then we can have that vehicle taken into the impound lots at the Police Department in order to make sure nobody can drive it in an unsafe manner for a period up to a year.”

The ordinance was modeled after programs in Denver, Pueblo and Westminster.

According to police officials, the new ordinance adds a civil process to the potential criminal charges the driver might face.

The ordinance, passed unanimously by the City Council in 2021, took effect in February. Police say they worked the past few months on “a detailed investigation including monitoring social media, warrants and other investigative tools,” to identify and eventually confiscate the three vehicles on display Tuesday, saying each was used in instances of reckless driving and street racing. The drivers of the vehicles also are facing criminal charges, according to police.

When vehicles are seized through the ordinance, there are multiple avenues law enforcement can take in determining what happens next.

“If we contact a bank or lienholder and they wish to take the car back, we can agree that they (bank or lienholder) will not give it back to the driver who was acting unsafe, and we will release it to them (the bank or lienholder),” Withrow said.

“Otherwise, we can hold it upon court order for up to a year, including a $500 civil judgment and payment of those impound cost and fees.”

Additionally, Withrow said there are safeguards in place to protect vehicle owners who have not participated in unsafe driving behaviors, such as parents who lent their cars to their kids who unknowingly participate in reckless driving, as well as financial institutions who hold a loan on a vehicle.

“We have provisions in our ordinance to allow for the release of the vehicle back to the actual owner of that car, with some agreements that the kid can no longer drive the vehicle in that way,” Withrow said.

“That process is much quicker and we can resolve it sooner in order to get the car back to the rightful owner.”

David Edmundson, CSPD deputy chief of patrol operations, said the department believes the ordinance will help improve driver behavior.

The CSPD policy states that police will only conduct a pursue a fleeing vehicle in cases of violent felonies or if the driver poses an immediate danger to the public, to avoid the hazards created by highspeed pursuits. Crimes such as speeding or running a red light on their own would not qualify.

“They may be presenting a serious reckless driving behavior that does not reach the level for us to pursue,” Edmundson said, “We’re looking to control that behavior.”

It is a common behavior, too. According to Edmundson, the department tracked 193 instances of eluding in 2022.

“So far this year, we’ve already had 184 (instances of eluding) so we’re going to far exceed that (numbers seen in 2022),” Edmundson said.

Now, an officer can fill out a case form that includes as many identifying characteristics of an evading vehicle as possible.

“Once we build up this pattern behavior, we start doing some background to see if we can determine with the City Attorney’s Office if we can seize that vehicle to hold these individuals accountable,” Edmundson said.