Unless it's in a police impound, that's illegal. They will escort you there and watch you pull whatever out of the car but they can't keep you from personal possessions inside the car. Go try again.

I think you can get permission from the place or from the courts to get items out of your vehicle if it's in impound.

Withdraw from an ATM.

Aren't they supposed to legally let you take your personal belongings out of your car after it's been towed? I mean even if they supervised you going to your car to make sure you don't run off with it or something, which I doubt OP would do but still, just trying to understand why they won't let you take your money out

sounds like what happened in the movie Walk Of Shame

You deserve it for leaving crap in the car.

I wonder if they would do this if OP had asthma and their inhaler was in the car. Something seems fishy to me, you ought to be able to access needed personal items.

were you there when they were towing it? You could've gotten in the car. And the would've been forced to put it down, if not it counts as kidnapping

Catch 22

That's messed up...ask a buddy to pay for it and them pay them back since you'll have your money...but still they should at least do something about that