FORT SMITH -- City directors are considering a proposal to raise downtown parking meter fees, but many downtown merchants would like to make parking free.
A proposed ordinance would double the rate for the 267 meters on Garrison Avenue, downtown's main street, from 25 cents for an hour to 25 cents for 30 minutes. For the 168 meters on downtown side streets, a quarter would buy 40 minutes of time instead of an hour if the ordinance passes.
The initial fine for a meter violation would double from $5 to $10, according to the ordinance.
The ordinance also proposed that the city parking lot on Garrison Avenue and Second Street, which has about 170 parking spaces, be converted from a free parking lot to a pay lot. The city has another parking lot downtown, at Garrison Avenue and Eighth Street, that it charges a fee to park in.
City Finance Director Jennifer Walker said Friday that it has not been determined how much revenue the Second Street lot would generate if it were converted into a pay lot. She also did not respond to a request for information on how much more revenue the proposed parking meter rate increases would produce.
The 2017 budget showed the estimated revenue for the parking fund -- which includes revenue from parking meters, the city's three-tier parking deck and meter penalties -- at $150,950 with expenses of $186,024. The budget estimated $103,925 would be spent on meter enforcement.
A Sept. 29 memorandum from Walker said the city's three-tier parking deck required about $270,000 in repairs and upgrades and construction of an automatic gate.
The memo said the city administration was considering the automatic gate and the elimination of the full-time parking deck attendant, a position that is vacant at the moment.
The revenue from the increased meter rates would be used to hire a commercial cleaning service to clean and maintain the parking deck, Walker's memo said.
The proposed ordinance was on the city directors' meeting agenda Tuesday. But before they began their discussion, City Director Kevin Settle moved to table it for 90 days to allow the opportunity for downtown merchants and the Central Business Improvement District to provide their opinions on the ordinance.
Bobby Aldridge with the Fort Smith Downtown Business Association said after hearing about the proposed ordinance that members had contacted all seven city directors to voice concern about being left out of the discussion on the parking meter fees. That led to the tabling of the ordinance, he said.
He said a survey of the association in February, when the group consisted of 20-25 members, showed 70 percent of those who responded favored no parking meters if a system could be devised to keep business owners and their employees from taking up the metered spaces that are meant for shoppers and those with business to conduct.
Central Business Improvement District board member Samuel T. Sicard said the concern has existed that downtown business employees and residents park all day in metered spaces that should be used for commerce and downtown patrons.
The position of the business association, which Aldridge said has about 85 members, grew out of a trial service the city provided last year in which parking downtown was made free in December.
Aldridge said association members in the survey reported increased business but attributed it more to improvement of the economy than to free parking.
The association also favors keeping the Second Street parking lot free as a place where downtown business employees can park instead of taking up on-street spaces needed for the public, he said.
Employees of several businesses on the west end of downtown use the Second Street lot because it is nearby, and there is no available parking around their businesses, Aldridge said.
Sicard said he has not decided whether to support instituting fees to park in the Second Street parking lot.
Deputy City Administrator Jeff Dingman said he plans to place the parking meter issue on the Central Business Improvement District board's agenda for its Oct. 17 meeting.
Sicard said the board discussed the meter issue about a year ago but had not brought it up recently. The board hasn't taken a position on the issue, he said.
He said he had no objection to meter rates being raised because it has been so long since the last rate increase. Dingman said the parking meter rates last were increased in 1985.
Doubling the rate did not seem exorbitant, he said, adding that even at 1985 prices, the proposed rate is not too high.
State Desk on 10/08/2017