FREE PARKING FOR ALL! - CITY EMPLOYEES THAT IS

Happy Weekend Regina!!

FREE PARKING FOR ALL! - CITY EMPLOYEES THAT IS

One of the major discoveries of the Downtown Parking Study - and probably one of the prime reasons it was hidden from public view for so long - was that a significant contributor to the Downtown parking nightmare is FREE parking provided to City Employees and "VIPs". It should be noted that this does not come as a shock to the downtown parking enforcement officers, as that was the #1 complaint when surveyed about the downtown parking when I ran for Mayor in 2012.

While it is not discussed exactly how many city employees and "VIP"s get this privilege, it does equate to an annual revenue loss of $1.4 MILLION! This translates to 55% of downtown parking spots being occupied by City employees or "VIP"s while you are driving around, struggling to find a spot that you have to pay two dollars an hour for!

What's worse - If you factor in the total permits issued, which includes free and significantly discounted permits, they account for a whopping 91% of the 1,250 metered spots in Regina. NINETY ONE PERCENT! This means that at any given time, there may be only 9% of the metered parking spots available for you to use. Without question, this is one of the key factors that should have been addressed long before the meter rates were doubled. Thankfully, the consultants also agree.

IMPORTANT TO NOTE: As there are currently no repercussions to these permit holders for parking longer than allowed, on average over 50% of them are overstaying their welcome compared to an average of 20% of coin parkers. Not only are they taking up valuable space that the rest of us pay for, they are staying far longer which multiplies the problem.

For those that don't want to read the full document, here is a clip for your ease of reference:

Why, then, has the City done nothing to address this situation?!

STAY TUNED FOR MORE!

CITY HALL IGNORES CONSULTANT'S PARKING RECOMMENDATIONS

Good evening Regina!

CITY HALL IGNORES CONSULTANT'S PARKING RECOMMENDATIONS

UPDATE: It turns out this report has never actually made it to City Council, let alone the public's eye. It was only because of a Freedom of Information Request by the Regina Leader Post that this report is even available for the public to now view. (As of April 2015) This is a very unfortunate situation, and one that needs to be addressed. Surprisingly, no other media outlet has touched this story yet. The City's public response to this has been that there are a lot of "administrative" tasks included in the report. If you take a read yourself, you will see this is certainly not the case.

In recent months, the City of Regina has become famous for it's overly strict parking enforcement, and in recent years, has made moves that has made the Downtown a parking nightmare. It has gotten so bad, in fact, the metered parking use has dwindled by a whopping 30% since the new rates went into effect.

Speaking of new rates, did you know? Your tax dollars (125,000 of them in fact) went out to a consulting company in 2013 with the sole purpose of studying Regina's parking and making recommendations on how to make it more palatable.

Well, it turns out that someone at City Hall didn't feel this report was worth the paper it is written on, because the City has chosen to do things their own way anyways - $125,000 report be damned. Sadly, this isn't a shocker, because it happens more often than we would like to believe.

One of the recommendations was to increase meter rates to $2/hr. But wait - isn't that what they did? Yes! However, the consultants recommended some very key upgrades to our parking infrastructure long before that was to be implemented. They recommended the new rate go into effect sometime between 2015-2017. Only AFTER off street parking is addressed to give more capacity for those that work or live downtown.

If you think this is atrocious - just wait! In the next while, I will be posting about more items of note that the City really ought to have done months upon months ago. 

STAY TUNED!

MISPLACED PRIORITIES: PARKING ENFORCEMENT "EDUCATION"

Hello Regina!!!

After a pretty long absence from the "City Beat", I've decided it's time to start posting a little more frequently once again. There are some pretty insane things happening at the City of Regina, and election time is just around the corner. What better time to remind those on Council and the great residents of Regina what issues are important and need better attention!

Briefly: Have you heard about the "oops" by the City of Regina lately? Apparently, they said they released "only" 1,000,000 Litres of "filtered" sewage into Wascana Creek, which flows into the Qu'appelle River, but they made a slight miscalculation, and it was actually 15,000,000 Litres. I'm not sure about you, but that discrepancy needs to be considered more than just an oversight, and someone at the City of Regina needs to be held accountable. Will it happen? Probably not.

Getting to today's big story, however, a story that has garnered much attention on Facebook through the Global and CJME posts today - one which was brought to you first by yours truly on my Chad4Regina Taxpayers Facebook page - the City of Regina turning their attention from Parking Enforcement to Parking Education. Wait....what?! What the hell is "parking education"?? My sentiments exactly. As I've said on Facebook, if you need an "education" program to explain your parking bylaws, perhaps your bylaws are too complex - or even more to the point - ludicrous and needless. (DISCLAIMER: They are by no means reducing enforcement here, they are simply reallocating current resources to "educate" people about the City's ludicrous parking bylaws while still ticketing the hell out of anyone that dares park an inch further away from the curb than they are allowed, or have their bumper hanging past the "no parking" signs)

For those that really want to know, it is the City of Regina spending your tax dollars to get parking enforcement officers to tell you "how best" to park. For example, if they approach you and ask how long you plan to be downtown, and you say all day, their "education" is to suggest parking in an off street parking lot. Apparently, citizens of Regina are assumed to be too stupid to figure that out in their own. 

Speaking of education, perhaps they should be educating their own staff?

 
The Million Dollar Question is:

What is the true purpose of this alleged education strategy? 

One can only wonder. 

Proactive planning for parking tickets perhaps?

Why is the City not investing it's time and resources and, more importantly, OUR MONEY, where it would be better served? Like actually working to provide additional off street parking locations for those that desire it. Leaving the on street parking for those that actually need it. You know, the customers that provide the necessary business to keep downtown businesses thriving? 

DID YOU KNOW? The City has experienced a 30% reduction in parking meter hours as per the 2014 City of Regina annual report. This means that either people are parking off street more (unlikely), simply not plugging meters (the data suggests this is not the case as parking ticket revenues have not skyrocketed), or are just avoiding the Downtown altogether. All data (straight from the City's own documents) point to the latter being the case. Surely downtown businesses have noticed this, and yet the City continutes to pretend it is not an issue!

 The solution here has to be far simpler than the City of Regina makes it out to be...

And the good news is that it is!

Come 2016, I plan to unveil a revolutionary plan that will allow all Regina residents, downtown visitors and downtown businesses to survive and thrive together in harmony.