The disclosure that the City of Butler's parking meters have been operating outside the legal requirements of Act 155, a state law passed in 1996, is an embarrassing revelation for a city already facing a plethora of other problems.

But while some people's first reaction might be to criticize city leaders for their failure to keep abreast of legislative developments in Harrisburg - a legitimate reaction - a significant amount of blame also must rest with the state legislature for its failure to get the word out about Act 155, which defines which weighing and measuring devices must be checked by certified personnel and at what time intervals.

Specifically, lawmakers representing Butler in 1996 did the city a disservice if they didn't send a memo to the city's elected leaders when the measure was signed into law. If notification was sent, the questions become who received the information and why it wasn't distributed to all city council members and officials of the Butler Parking Authority.

Did the Pennsylvania League of Cities really not reach out to its members about Act 155 and follow up on whether its members were in compliance?

Under Act 155, parking meters are required to be checked and recertified every three years by a person certified to do the testing. That testing must be done with a stopwatch whose accuracy has been certified by the state.

The issue came to light last week when Butler police Chief Tim Fennell informed the authority that a man had successfully fought a ticket because the city had failed to comply with the certification law.

That the city's meters have not been certified for accuracy will presumably negatively impact other tickets that have been issued and that have not yet been paid. Whether there will be an impact on tickets that have been paid will have to be determined by legal authorities.

No doubt the meter snafu will result in a "hit" to city and authority coffers until the meter certifications are carried out. The fine for parking at a meter whose time has expired is $5, and the past year has witnessed stepped-up meter enforcement - meaning that there has been a significant inflow of parking-related revenue beyond what is normally deposited into meters or paid via parking permits.

The city and authority have a combined total of 1,578 meters. Certifying all of those meters is not going to be an easy task - and how long it will take to repair "cheating" meters remains open to speculation.

But at this juncture there is one certainty: Butler city officials and the county's state lawmakers need to make sure that their lines of communication are better than what existed in 1996.

City officials have cause to be red-faced over what has occurred, but some of those who have had to pay tickets are justified in being red-faced for having been ticketed outside the legal parameters of current law - especially those who believed that the money they deposited in meters was enough for the time they intended to spend in the city but turned out not to be.

People shouldn't be left wondering whether they'll be "ripped off" by a parking meter if they decide to shop or do other business downtown. Meanwhile, city leaders shouldn't have to wonder whether they've missed something else that happened in the state capital.