Once upon a time there was free parking at the Branchville train station. As we know, it's a small lot with about 150 available spaces. It has a few ruts in it.... oh... and a speed bump.
Then poor little Ridgefield got into financial trouble by spending beyond its means so it starting looking around for more income.
Sensing a possible revolt of two thirds of its residents if property taxes continued to rise unabated, it turned to another possible source of income -- the Parking Authority -- to come up with a plan.
And lo & behold, it did...... in the form of parking permits for the Branchville Station. But, as usual, how the fees were computed didn't make any sense. We have a history with this kind of miscalculation.
At the BoS meeting at which these parking fees were introduced, it was suggested that a $250 annual fee & a $6.00 daily fee were reasonable. The parking permits would be decided by lottery. A variety of people stood up to say they were comfortable with this arrangement. A fair number of these people were from Redding.
I asked (1) how this fee structured had been calculated and (2) why was it necessary this year, it being another difficult year financially.
The Answers: (1) By comparison, the fees were higher in neighboring towns. (2) Our Highway Department had to fix the ruts in the parking lot out of their current budget. No one added this had caused any hardship, that the time it took to do it was excessive or that this project had put the department over budget.
Since no one was getting my drift, I decided to change tactics & stated that I thought we were going about the process 'bass ackward' [sic]; that it made more sense to first figure the costs of whatever was required to maintain the lot (or we wanted to do to improve it) & from that, to extrapolate a parking fee to support the project, thus causing no expense to slop over to anyone except those who used the facility, i.e. commuters.
'Oh', said, the First Selectman, 'we know the costs: repaving costs about three thousand dollars and we are thinking about putting in new lights and a few other amenities so we pretty much know what it's going to cost'. JR: 'Oh.... and how much is that'? RM: 'Like I said: three thousand dollars to repave the parking lot'.
So now you know how the fee was calculated.
I don't know about you but I feel better now.
Well, here's another suggestion. A committee comprised of a Parking Commission member, the First Selectman, the head of the Highway Department, some commuters, the town engineer & the Financial Director sit in a room and they:
1. make a list of all the improvements wanted or needed
2. cost out those improvements
3. figure annual maintenance to keep it all in tip top shape, another selling point for Ridgefield
4. decide on the simplest system using the least amount of time/energy to administer it (parking kiosk or a lottery?)
5. create a spreadsheet to see how these costs could be absorbed by the users, i.e. commuters w/o any costs to non-commuters.
Suppose I said that by doing it this way, we could reduce the $250 parking fee to $200?
Or suppose I said that, as a result of this exercise, we discovered that the suggested fees would not cover the costs so those extra costs would have to be added as an expense line in the town budget & thus paid for by property owners (in which case, we would also be paying for commuting Reddingites)?
Or suppose I said, the one & only reason this subject has come up at all is that Ridgefield is looking for extra income via a back door (like the Police Department tried with the flagman episode) & that this fee is not really necessary at all.
Well, I have my opinion. What's yours?
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