His apartment is located above a commercial retail building.

Like most people he has a home office. His consists of a small desk, a computer and a fax machine.

There is one way in and out of his home. A deadbolt-locked door which can only be accessed by key. No clients visit his home.

Recently he put up a sign designating where his business mail was to go. A city parking official saw this sign and assumed he was running a business and began charging him a business parking tax.

This tax was for 1000 square feet even though the apartment is only 800 square feet. The city has no designation for anything under 1000.

This raised some concern for Craven's neighbors.
Emily Cahal lives in the same building as Craven. She also has a home office but is not getting charged a business parking tax.

"The city has an outdated code; they need to go back through and redefine what makes a business," she said.

Does Lyle Craven's home office constitute a business? He has no clientele visiting. Monday through Friday, he reports to an office in Beaverton.

A representative from the city's financial office said they could not make any comment on this but that they were looking into it.

While they look into the issue, they still expect Craven to pay the $170 parking tax.

"When I have a dispute with my electric bill, I don't pay it until a good reason for me to pay it has been given," Emily Cahal said.

At this point even if he takes down the sign, he would still get charged because the city knows he is there.

Craven has been given a 30-day extension of his payment.

The plan for downtown Salem is to make it a more vibrant and livable location. However, before finishing that it may have a little house cleaning to do on its ordinances. The current code is dated 1978.

With the growth of computers and high usage of the Internet, it is almost expected for someone to have a home office to assist their professional job.  Under the current code each person who does is liable to a parking tax.