Salinas City Council considers parking fee increase in downtown

Many businesses are up in arms with a potential parking permit fee increase in downtown Salinas.

The Salinas City Council on Tuesday considered whether to raise the hourly and monthly permit fees in five parking areas in the downtown district, including the Monterey Street parking garage next to Maya Cinemas.

City staff say the city-run paid parking areas are costing more to operate and maintain than they are taking in in revenue.

In fact, the city says in the last three years, they have been losing hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The solution given to the council: increase the hourly and monthly permit rates. Staff estimates doing this will bring in around $250,000 of additional revenue, still not enough to make up their losses though.

Right now, parking at the Monterey Street garage costs 50 cents an hour. The new proposal would bump it up to a dollar an hour. It is something residents do not seem to mind.

“I’m actually very frequent here in downtown. So I wouldn’t mind paying an extra 50 cents to spend an hour here,” said Joel Lopez, a Salinas resident.

“It’s not a big deal. I think the value is definitely there, right? I mean, especially when you compare our pricing to the Bay Area,” said Jose Garcia, another Salinas resident.

But the bigger controversy lies in the monthly permit rates. Many downtown workers using Lot 5 behind Rabobank in downtown Salinas need a permit to park there. Their $40 a month fee would jump to $75 a month under the new proposal.

KION tried speaking with some of the permit holders at Lot 5 after work, but none of them wanted to go on camera. All of the ones we did speak with did not agree with the increase. Some said they would end up biking to work instead.

It is not only Lot 5 getting a big price jump. The Monterey Street garage and the upper lots at another city garage between Salinas Street and Lincoln Avenue would see a $20 increase from the current $20 a month.

It is something one manager says her business just cannot afford.

“With the proposed increase, we would be paying roughly almost $10,000 a year, which is something we would not be able to continue,” said Mayra Sides, the manager of AllCare Pharmacy.

Now because of the concerns brought up by Sides and others, the City Council unanimously decided to table the resolution for a future vote. They said they want to flesh out more details and continue talks with stakeholders.

Another thing the city is looking at: possible metered parking in downtown.