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REGULAR MEETING October 10, 2016 collection rates. The whole idea of Smart Streets was to bring people downtown and make it friendlier. Now we are going to jack these rates up, which are in some cases a little crazy, which would discourage people from coming downtown. We have other issues with parking. If you go to the courthouse there is very limited parking, which is dedicated to the police. Then if a resident goes into the courthouse and is stuck there too long and then you get a time violation ticket. There shouldn't be any parking limit in front of the courthouse. There are also spots outside this building that are very confusing to understand between the lack of signs and curb painting. This is a nice little trap to raise money. Also, Mr. Davis asked why Mr. Perri is up here talking about these ordinances because this is supposed to be run by DTSB. Mr. Perri was given the opportunity for a rebuttal. He stated just to clear up confusion, the garages are currently operating at about a $900,000 annual loss inclusive of capital. What we stand to gain is to take that down about $200,000 by the parking fine program and new parking rate structures. The idea is to make a kinder and gentler parking enforcement by introducing part - time parker rates, residential parking rates, increasing the number of two (2) hour spaces, and adding the warning ticket as well as the amnesty day. Finally, he stated he is speaking as a representative of the Parks Department. Recently parking garages were assigned from the Department of Community Investment to the Parks Department. Historically they were always run by the Parks Department, they went to Community Investment for a period of time, and now they are back under Parks. DTSB does do the operations of the garages and they are a strong partner with this and have been involved throughout the entire study. Councilmember Davis thanked Mr. Perri because she was really concerned that here we were just increasing another fee but at least there has been some creativity and consideration in terms of how can we offer relief as well. With the amnesty day program and with the warning ticket being issued first that is great. Also increasing the number of spaces which are two -hour parking is a great idea as well. At least there has been an effort and she stated she recognizes it and appreciates it. The City needs to continue to think in this way anytime we talk about raising fees also to be creative to lesser the burden. and provide some relief. Councilmember Davis stated that's why his first question was about the budget, because of that conversation it has come out that the garages are $900,000 in the hole. He asked how long the garages have been in debt like that and what has been done in the past to get out of that hole. This ordinance does not bring us completely out of the hole and he has a concern that there will be increased policing to get out of the hole. It was shared we do not know what our projected revenues will be. We may be back here next year asking to raise fees again. We have to find other measures to take care of those things, we keep hiking up all of our fees. We are trying to tell everyone to come downtown but we are hiking the fees. Mr. Perri responded that there is an appropriate level of subsidies that taxpayers will bear as a whole and that's how we have been making up the gap. We are meeting budget, but we are just subsidizing it from other areas of the City. If we wanted to have completely no subsidies for the garages it would be $125 per month per parker and we shouldn't go that high. Councilmember Davis asked where we are subsidizing it from. John Murphy, City Controller with offices on the 12th Floor of the County -City Building, responded we subsidize from a few funds. The TIF fund is one (1) fund we have used at times, other times we have used COIT. Those are probably the two (2) primary funds we have used. Really the capital expenditures have been more of a problem. In the past we really were deferring capital and breaking even just by the parking garage fund itself, but now the capital is really catching up with us so we have put more money into capital the past four (4) or five (5) years from those sources. Councilmember Tim Scott made a motion to send Substitute Bill 58 -16 to the full Council with a favorable recommendation. Councilmember Karen White seconded the motion which carried by a voice vote of eight (8) ayes and one (1) nay. ( Councilmember Oliver Davis) 59 -16 12 PUBLIC HEARING ON AN ORDINANCE OF THE COMMON COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF