Christmas is coming early to downtown Orillia.
City councillors voted Monday night to slash enforcement of parking infractions in the downtown by about 20% beginning July 1. That decision must be ratified by council at its regular meeting June 4.
“This to me sounds like a win-win,” said Coun. Sarah Valiquette-Thompson, who championed fast-tracking the idea to launch this summer. Staff suggested the idea be presented at budget deliberations for potential implementation next year.
“We hear constant complaints from downtown business owners from constantly seeing bylaw officers,” said Valiquette-Thompson. “It’s one thing to see that yellow ticket (on the windshield) but just the image of constantly seeing bylaw officers going in and out of the cars” is frustrating.
In response to an earlier request from council, staff presented two detailed reports Monday night: one on the impact of free downtown parking and one about reduced enforcement.
“Through research and analysis, one concept stood out,” Jeremy Dutka, a project engineer, told councillors: “Free parking is a misnomer.”
He noted “there is a cost to maintaining municipal parking” which in Orillia’s case includes more than 1,000 municipal parking spaces. This cost is currently allocated to those who use the service through paid parking in a user-pay system. If free parking was provided, that money would have to come from somewhere else.
While council seemed to agree that free parking might not be affordable – such a move would potentially translate into higher taxes and/or higher fees for downtown business owners – most agreed relaxing enforcement would help remedy the situation.
Mayor Steve Clarke said he agreed with the concept of less enforcement, but he didn’t think the timing was right to green-light the plan for implementation July 1.
He said the city’s plan to move to a pay-by-phone app system – expected to debut in July – would have a “very positive and significant” impact and should “dramatically reduce” ticket anxiety. He said he would like to see data from that project before moving to reduce enforcement.
But Valiquette-Thompson said the two are separate issues. She said the city should reduce enforcement as soon as possible to “send a message” that the city is listening to its citizens and to ensure it’s more “in line” with other municipalities.
Shawn Crawford, the city’s manager of legislative services, compared the city’s enforcement levels with several other municipalities as part of his report to council.
Staff contacted 13 other municipalities that have metered parking in their downtown to discern how many tickets are issued, on average, per parking space.
Crawford said that survey “found 10 of the 13 municipalities (which ranged in population size from 16,000 to over 100,000) issued less tickets per space than Orillia. So, by going to a 20% reduction what that essentially means is that (rate) would land enforcement in the middle of the comparative group.”
In real numbers, he said, a 20% reduction would translate into about 1,800 less parking tickets issued in the downtown each year. Currently, bylaw officers issue about 8,870 tickets per year in the downtown area.
In addition to the new phone app, Crawford said bylaw enforcement officers will adopt a new uniform when working the downtown core. Rather than their current ‘police’ look, officers will wear bright polo tops in what staff hope is a more “friendly” look; staff are also going to receive customer-service training.
Crawford said relaxing enforcement would also free up his staff to focus on other concerns. He said over the last three years, there has been a 177% increase in “the number of occurrences”. As a result, officers don’t “get to complaints as quickly as they used to.”
He said the reduced enforcement downtown would free up officers to tackle two big issues: littering and complaints related to properties that could be addressed through enforcement of the city’s clean and clear bylaw.
Clarke said that issue is not related to downtown parking enforcement.
“That sounds like an issue that should come back to budget if we’re under resourced,” said the mayor. “That’s something we should be addressing” separately.
In the end, however, the majority of council agreed to slash enforcement in the downtown starting July 1.
“The uniform change and technology are both steps in the right direction, but to actually see we are in fact higher than (other) municipalities … it will be so nice to get us in line from a fairness perspective,” said Valiquette-Thompson.
She said the move could help downtown merchants compete against online retailers and big-box stores/malls that offer free parking. “I’m not saying we’re solving the parking debacle … but it would be nice to get in line with other municipalities (regarding enforcement levels.)”
