County closer to paid parking at boat ramps

By Jack Chavez Staff Writer

(June 9, 2023) The Worcester County Commissioners passed legislation that will allow the county to charge for parking on county-owned property on Tuesday.

In a 6-to-1 vote with Commissioner Ted Elder opposed, the commissioners laid the groundwork for what some on the board of commissioners hope will be a viable revenue stream, especially during the busy summer months.

“(This is) simply adding the word ‘paid’ to our parking provisions to make expressly clear that the county commissioners can designate certain areas of county property for paid parking,” county attorney Roscoe Leslie said in introducing the legislation.

The county hopes to have some- thing in place by the end of the summer.

“If it gets voted favorably today, it can go into effect in 45 days,” Chief Administrative Officer Weston Young said. “I think the steps on any boat landing would be adequately striping and then choosing a (paid parking app) like ParkMobile or one of those to go through those contract negations. There are a few steps to try to get in place but looking at end of summer, probably.”

One of the goals of the new commissioner majority — a more fiscally conservative bloc that has thus far removed the county from sports complex talks, curbed school spending and put up the county’s portable ice rink for auction — is saving money to keep up with rising costs overall.

The move to monetize parking is one of the few ways thus far that the new majority has presented to generate money.

After the vote, county officials introduced a bill that clarifies the code on boat landings.

“There are three main (emphases) of this change, to clarify what commercial uses are and to allow them at boat ramps to the extent that they don’t interfere with recreational use … restrict parking for commercial users and their guests to one space and … requiring heavy-equipment operators to register and be adequately insured if they’re using the boat ramps,” Leslie said.

He added that they may have “beefed up language” on commercial user parking to present at the next meeting.

Commissioner Joe Mitrecic asked if funding mechanisms could be affected by the legislation, to which Leslie said that language is tailored to use the criteria of state grant distrib- utors.

Deciding what constitutes interference with recreational use will be dealt with on a case-by-case basis, Leslie added, but it will consider the potential for damage.

Commissioner President Chip Bertino cautioned that commissioners will need to be mindful of boat dealers, who often use boat ramps and have a customer and more than one vehicle with them.

“I think we need to be sensitive to that,” he said. “I don’t know how we do it, other than maybe change the number of parking spaces. I don’t know but that would fall in violation as currently written.”

Previously, county officials have said that sheriff’s deputies could police the boat ramps and enforce the new legislation.

Bertino and Commissioners Jim Bunting, Eric Fiori, Diana Purnell and Caryn Abbott signed on to the bill.