As of this week, city officials can no longer brag about the number of electric cars they have in their arsenal of municipal-owned vehicles.
Eleven were removed from a Public Works yard by auto manufacturer Nissan on Wednesday where they had been stored since late July. Nissan owned the zero-emission cars and wanted them back because a five-year contract lease agreement is about to expire.
Pasadena Water and Power had been leasing the Hyperminis from the Japanese auto manufacturer and wanted to keep them. City officials offered to purchase the cars, or at least renew their original agreement, but Nissan representatives said that wasn’t possible because temporary waivers from the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration to operate the cars on U.S. roads are about to expire.
The first attempt to retrieve the cars by Nissan on Aug. 8 proved unsuccessful. Citing procedural reasons, city officials said they could not release the cars to them.
But Nissan did not back down and finally picked up the cars, leaving the city with just three other all-electric vehicles.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on August 26, 2006. Read the original PDF.