Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAbout08-11-10 Parking Commission Minutes Bozeman Parking Commission Meeting August 11, 2010, 7:00 a.m. City Hall Commission Room Parking Commissioners in Attendance: Pam Bryan Chris Pope Chris Naumann Tammy Hauer Ben Bennett Ben Lloyd Lisa Danzl-Scott City Staff in Attendance: Ashlie Portnell, Parking Clerk Paul Burns, Parking Manager Cyndy Andrus, City Commissioner Guests in Attendance: None Action Items:  Paul will be presenting the parking permit expenses at the September meeting.  Paul will come up with a new policy on renting out the downtown parking lots, detailing prices and when they would be available. ________________________________________________________________________ Call to Order 7:30 – Call to order Pam called the meeting to order. 7:31 – 7:35 – Approval of June 9 and July 8 minutes Chris P made a motion to approve the minutes for June 9, 2010, which was seconded by Chris N. The minutes were unanimously approved. Chris N made a motion to approve the minutes for July 8, 2010 and they were seconded by Ben B. The minutes were unanimously approved. Public CommentState name & address. Limit comments to 3 minutes. – No comments were received. 7:40 – 8:00 – Manager’s report The Bruce Eiting hearing was originally set for July, but is currently postponed until August 18, 2010. He is appealing the boot and parking tickets. Paul applied to join the TIFD as a non- voting member. He will attend the August meeting. Paul was in Missoula on Monday August 9, 2010, and met with Bill Lake to talk about the Missoula Parking Garage (MPG]. He learned that they do a lot of their own maintenance work, which is a benefit because they have more control over their expenses and have been able to save a lot of money. They have eleven staff members, which allows them to have time and redundancy to accomplish this. The Missoula Parking Executive is putting on a seminar on August 16, 2010. Paul is going to attend. Bozeman will be hosting this event next September. He received an update from Greg Sullivan, City Attorney, on the garage advertising. He said it is a great idea, but the code needs to be revised. Paul is going to talk with the City Commissioners. 8:00 – 8:10 – Final FY10 budget report The Bozeman Parking Commission [BPC] is still waiting on invoices from Martel. There was a discussion on the final 2010 budget, and the current FY11 budget. Paul presented a spreadsheet that showed the monthly garage revenues and it was noted that July was a very good month for the garage. The total revenue was $5,387.00. This number does not reflect our permit holders. We had 157 permit holders for the month of July. This number keeps increasing every month. The finance report Paul handed out showed FY2011 Budget, the year to date 2011 actuals, the remaining budget balance and the percent of budget remaining. Paul also handed out a handout comparing FY2010 to FY2011 actual revenues and expenses. There was an email sent out to City Commissioners asking why residents have to pay for their MSU residential Permits. If we did not charge for having a permit then we would not have adequate funds to pay for city personnel, patrolling and printing decals and brochures for the residents each year. The money made from the sale of permits helps to fund the overall operations of the parking districts. 8:10 – 8:15 – Renting parking lots (if someone wants to rent a lot for an event, how much money?) Paul has created a policy about renting the lots downtown. He thinks $80.00 is a good price for the Rouse lot and the North Willson lot next to Sterling Bank. The Black lot is a bigger lot so he suggested a price of $100.00. Another option is renting the lots based on the square footage needed. Paul requested the lots only be rented on weekends and holidays. Chris P made a motion to approve the concept of renting lots at $2.00 per space and to have a formal policy created for renting out the lots. Chris N seconded the motion and it was unanimously approved. 8:15 – 8:35 – Long-term maintenance schedule Pam and Paul will be attending the August TIFD Board meeting. It was suggested that on behalf of the Parking Commission she thank them for their great commitment to the Parking Garage. The maintenance schedule handout reflects what the Parking Commission plans to spend for Fiscal Years 2011-2020. There was discussion about putting money into the maintenance reserve fund; however there is no balanced budget yet. 8:35 – 8:45 – MSU Management 463 class (assist BPC with customer survey, web page) Professor Bishops 463 class at MSU has seniors who are looking to do a project in the city. He is interested in putting together a project for the city. A couple ideas the Parking Commission have was for them to do a customer survey or possibly put together a web page. Professor Bishop is lining up organizations statewide to get students involved in the community. This project might take place in January. Paul will get back to Professor Bishop with their ideas. 8:45 – 8:50 – Parking study update The Western Transportation Institute [WTI] is completing the Downtown inventory. They will only be doing portions of the downtown area, studying the occupancy rates and dwell times. Paul asked WTI to give specific thoughts on both the North and South Willson lots. Chris P talked about doing a town meeting, once the inventory is finished. The meeting would talk about how the program is doing. The Commission talked about getting a snapshot of one of the lots downtown to see what a Thursday night looks like after hours. At the end of August, the Commission should have a summary update. 8:50 – 8:55 – Pro-rate MSU parking permits (currently $10 for September to August) The City Commission received a complaint from a resident about having to purchase permits to park at their homes. Students are also upset because of the requirements of what they are expected to bring for proof of residency to purchase a permit. The Commission talked about prorating the permits, so if someone is purchasing a permit for the May through August months, they would not have to pay the full $10.00. 8:55 – New business Chris N passed out a handout regarding a change to the Parking Garage rates in an effort to provide a more competitive parking environment in the downtown district. Chris N made a motion to move the BPC increase parking to two hours free in the garage instead of a half hour, and have free parking in the garage on Saturday. Chris P seconded the motion. A discussion ensued. Cyndi asked about doing a promotion for this. Chris N will put something together. Some questions that were discussed where would we lose revenue doing this? Will this change too much and take away our good numbers? We have underpriced parking in the garage as is. Maybe we change the rates to balance out the revenue. We will still ticket in the lots, but then it’s free to park in the garage. It’s kind of a reversal. Changing whether or not the garage will be free on Saturdays, and having the rates go up or down will get confusing to the public, the parking commission needs to come up with a plan, possibly do some advertising, to get the public familiar with the changes, and finally enforce the new plan. Pam thinks we should wait to change the rates until January. Ben B stated, from a marketing strategy, you look for momentum, and you leverage it. You capitalize on what product can do better than your competitor. Teaching people and changing behavior is key. If you keep the policy simple, people will catch on quicker. The sign entering the garage should state something like, the first two hours are free, and then it’s one dollar after that. It was decided to put this off until the September meeting. Chris N tabled the motion. 9:00 – Adjournment The meeting was adjourned at 9:48 a.m. Respectfully Submitted Ashlie Portnell, Parking Clerk