Wayne County, MI Parking Rules: Towing & Impound Rights (2026)

Reach is the first thing to settle here, because Wayne County contains Detroit, Westland and more than forty other municipalities that police their own streets. The county code answers it three different ways depending on which chapter you are under. Chapter 241 adopts the Michigan Vehicle Code by reference only “to govern vehicular traffic on streets and highways under the jurisdiction of the county” (Sec. 241-1), and Sec. 241-2 declares that where that state code says “local authorities” it means the county. So the ordinary police-ordered tow under MCL 257.252 runs on the county road system as a county matter, not on a city street. Chapter 213 reaches further in territory but narrower in agency: Sec. 213-2(a) makes the drunk and drugged driving conduct unlawful “on all streets, highways and other public places within the jurisdiction of the county,” and Sec. 213-2(c)(1) provides the vehicle “shall be impounded by the county sheriff pending completion of prosecution.” That is a Sheriff-action power, not a rule binding a Detroit or Westland tow operator.

The forfeiture chapter is the genuinely countywide one. Chapter 207, Division 1, the street racing public nuisance ordinance last amended by Ord. No. 2024-092 effective February 15, 2024, lets a civil action be brought in the name of the County by the Michigan Attorney General, the Wayne County Prosecuting Attorney, “the City or Township attorney for the municipality in which the public nuisance may be found,” or by a not-for-profit neighborhood organization with at least five members living within a one-mile radius of the nuisance site (Sec. 207-5(b)). Notice under Sec. 207-7 is published on “the local unit of government’s public website,” which only makes sense if the seizing agency is a city police department. Division 2, the 2022 nudity and lewd conduct division, then does something unusual and says so out loud: Sec. 207-27 states the Division “is adopted under the home rule powers of the Charter County of Wayne, which are inferior to home rule powers of a municipality” and “is not enforceable in a municipality that has an ordinance or resolution that regulates the conduct prohibited in this Division.” A city can opt out simply by legislating on the same subject.

For an owner whose car has been taken under Chapter 207, the clock is the whole story. Within five days of the seizure the seizing agency must submit to the District Court covering the seizure location a warrant and draft order for continued impoundment, granted ex parte on probable cause. The agency must then serve a written Notice of Seizure in person or by certified mail with signature required; if the owner cannot be found, the notice runs on the local government website and in a newspaper of general circulation for ten successive publishing days. The owner then has thirty days from service to file a written Notice of Claim and Objection with the seizing agency, signed and carrying a current address, telephone number, email address and a copy of a government issued ID. File it and the Prosecutor must commence a civil action within ninety days of the seizure, with the parties able to ask for trial inside ninety days of service and a trial date required within one hundred eighty days absent good cause. Miss the thirty days and the vehicle is forfeited to the seizing agency outright.

Two provisions cut against a quick self-help recovery. Sec. 207-7(i) removes the usual replevin route: property held under the chapter “is not subject to an action to recover personal property but is deemed to be in the custody of the seizing agency.” And release pending trial is not a matter of paying a tow bill. Under Sec. 207-7(f) the court may release the vehicle only on a finding that temporary use is necessary for the owner, claimant or an immediate family member or dependent, and then only on a bond equal to the fair market value of the property. A lienholder gets its own separate door: an innocent lien holder or secured interest party has sixty days from service of the Notice of Seizure to claim the vehicle for payment of towing and storage fees, on a hold harmless agreement. If the case runs to judgment, Sec. 207-6(b) allows continued impoundment for up to one year, and on sale the proceeds pay the costs of keeping the property and the sale first, then bona fide liens, then court costs and enforcement reimbursement, with the balance going to the Wayne County general fund.

The bond amounts are worth comparing, because the county set three of them at three different figures. Chapter 207 racing and nudity seizures take a bond equal to the fair market value of the vehicle. A vehicle impounded by the Sheriff under Chapter 213 for a drunk or drugged driving arrest comes out on a $500.00 cash bond, conditioned on the defendant appearing at trial and securing costs and fines; if it is never bonded out, Sec. 213-2(c)(3) has it sold and the net proceeds applied to assessed costs, then the costs of disposition, then the fine, with any balance remitted to the owner. A vehicle impounded as the source of amplified noise under Sec. 170-5 takes a $1,000.00 cash bond.

What the code does not contain anywhere is a tow rate. There is no hook fee, no mileage rate, no daily storage figure and no weight-class table in the Wayne County Code of Ordinances. The single place the county acknowledges the money is Sec. 170-5(b), which returns an impounded vehicle only after payment of the civil penalty and “the reasonable costs of towing and storage, as established in the comprehensive fee ordinance,” a separate instrument the towing chapters do not reproduce. Detroit and Westland, both inside the county, publish their own release charges and their own review routes; the county code neither sets those charges nor displaces them. A Wayne County resident asking what a tow costs is asking a city question, while a resident asking how to get a seized car back before a forfeiture judgment is asking a county one.