On June 10, the city hired a “public service technician” to check whether parking meters have expired and to write citations. The new employee is paid $40,893 per year.
During the first six-plus weeks on the job, the new employee wrote more than 1,000 tickets.
Hamilton hadn’t had such a full-time employee since December 2017, so the stepped-up enforcement is actually a return to earlier levels, said Brandon Saurber, the city’s director of strategy & information.
That hiring “has really worked out well, depending on, I guess, which side of the table you sit, because I’ve been getting a lot of complaints about parking tickets,” Smith said. “But, the good news is, I’ve heard a lot of positive from the retailers. They see the person out ticketing. Cars are moving a lot more quickly now.”
Scott Hubbard, manager of The Almond Sisters Bakery on High Street, said he has noticed the difference.
“We have a lot of people who complain about there not ever being any parking, and we rely on, honestly, just a few spots right out in front of our business for most of our non-foot-traffic customers,” Hubbard said. “When those spots are taken by people who would just park there for hours, or all day, it’s harder for our customers to find an empty spot.”
Hubbard added there is clearly more availability for those who want to visit those businesses.
“This is based on the increased traffic on High Street and the adjacent streets to High Street,” Smith said. “We’ve been getting a lot of complaints from the retailers that people are not moving” their vehicles.
“This is not to be punitive. We actually stayed away from parking meters for the longest time to encourage people to come back downtown. This really is to help the retailers make sure that people are circulating enough that they’re getting their customers in.”
Smith said some High Street eateries have told him, “if they can’t see a parking spot within a block or so, they will literally drive by, and go somewhere else — so it’s really important that that circulation be maintained.”
The city also has purchased eight multi-space parking meters, the kind where motorists who park in several nearby spaces use one machine to pay for parking. The machines print a receipt that lists the date and when the parking time expires. Drivers put the receipts behind their windshield so the parking enforcer can read them.
The eight machines, to be installed in October, cost $85,000.
Smith said if the machines work well, the city likely will buy more in 2020.
Some will be installed on High Street, with others on Dayton Street and Riverfront Plaza, the streets to the north and west of the new Marcum development downtown that includes apartments, a bar, restaurants and salon.
Currently, parking spaces on Riverfront Plaza and Dayton Street have a two-hour limit, but Smith said many people working nearby have been ignoring that limit and staying in the same spaces all day.
“We’re going to do everything in our power to keep these ticket prices as low as possible,” Smith said. “This is not a subsidy to the general fund (which pays for most city services). All the money stays in the parking fund.”
The city merely wants to be able to pay the costs of the parking enforcer and other parking-related costs, such as maintenance of the parking meters, Smith said.
In deciding where to place the multiple-spot parking meters, Hamilton had a visit from Cincinnati parking officials to offer their expertise, said city Engineer Rich Engle.
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