HomeMy WebLinkAbout8/1/2001 - STAFF REPORTS (37) '���?K 3 gin, ,;,Y;,,:•,,.__ __.
Palm Springs Created its Own Parking Problem
Recent comments made by Palm Springs Councilman Jim Jones indicate that he
does not believe that any public funds ought to be spent to assist with the provision for
additional downtown parking. I strongly disagree with his position and believe he may
not be familiar with the City's deliberate and preeminent role in the creation of the
parking shortage.
As any businessman can readily testify, regardless of the Valley community in which
you choose to open a business, you must provide the necessary parking to support
that enterprise. However, in Palm Springs, things are a little different. If you want to
open in the downtown area and cannot provide all the required parking due to land
availability problems, the City has a program which allows you to pay a fee rather than
provide the actual spaces. This is called an "In Lieu Parking Fee" and the monies are
required to go into a special fund to be used solely for the provision of public parking.
Back in 1979, when we built our restaurant, the City required us to pay $187,000 in
parking fees. Just since 1998, the City has collected over $302,000 in "In Lieu" fees
from other businesses on my block alone. And while it may be true that the City's
parking lots have been improved over the last two decades, it is also true that not one
new parking space has actually been developed south of Tahquitz Canyon Drive as a
result of collecting all that money. (When we expanded the restaurant in 1998, we
again were required to pay additional $64,000 of "In Lieu" fees to support the new
seats.)
When the recession hit in the early `90's, the City decided that it needed to create an
incentive to help rejuvenate the downtown area. The City Council adopted a
marketing concept to convert the area into an Arts and Entertainment District and
changed the parking requirements to allow existing buildings to greatly intensify their
uses, and their parking demand, without having to add any additional parking. They
also reduced the In Lieu Parking Fee to less than 25% of the actual cost to provide
real parking. When it was pointed out that a parking shortage would surely develop,
the Council felt it was more important to jump start the downtown economy first and
they'd tackle the parking shortage later.
The plan worked. Within a few short years, the downtown became alive again and
new businesses were opening. Boutiques, shops, and restaurants sprang up at a
wonderful rate and vacancy rates plummeted. And with them came a serious parking
crisis, induced by the incentives the Council had adopted, just as many of us
predicted. Within just the two block area near my business, a parking shortage of over
400 spaces exists just for employees, not to mention the needs of our patrons! Of
those desperately needed employee spaces, over 30% work for The Follies, which is
a private enterprise paying rent to the City, yet the City provides them with no parking
whatsoever. Furthermore, The Follies has no parking for its 800 seats, nor bus
parking for the many tours it attracts.
In order to address the parking shortage, several committees made up of merchants,
hoteliers, property owners, and City officials have been meeting for over a year. Eight
different alternatives were evaluated and prioritized as to their cost efficiencies and
ability to address the problem. The proposal in front of the City was for a 50/50 cost
split to solve a portion of the parking problem. Councilman Jones attended many of
the meetings, yet he never voiced any concerns about the solution being a
collaborative private/public effort.
Then, at the last minute, after all the work and consensus building was done,
preliminary designs drawn up, business and property owners consulted, Mr. Jones
announces he is opposed to any public funds being used to solve the problem! And
when his views turned out not to be shared by his fellow councilmembers, he decided
to start a petition drive to stop the project!
The parking problem in downtown Palm Springs is a contrived shortage, induced by
the City, and ought to be solved as soon as possible. The City has a responsibility to
partner with the rest of the businesses in our area to solve this problem. Not a single
one of the property owners or businesses that are willing to contribute to the building
of the parking structure is technically "parking deficient' according to the City codes,
yet we recognize the problem and are willing to cooperatively contribute to its solution.
I hope, for the sake of our community, that Mr. Jones will give his position more
thought and embrace the unique opportunity before us.
Ric Service
Mr. Service is co-owner of Las Casuelas Terraza
and a former Palm Springs City Planner
and Chairman of the Planning Commission