Shauna Perkins, co-owner of The Diner, brought up some downtown Warsaw parking issues to the Warsaw Traffic Commission, particularly those in front of her business. Photo by David Slone, Times-Union.

By David Slone
Times-Union

WARSAW — The cost of a downtown Warsaw parking ticket could soon be increasing, the Warsaw Traffic Commission heard a couple times at their meeting Wednesday, March 5. When and by how much weren’t revealed as the details are still being hammered out.

Main Street Warsaw Downtown Development Director Terry Sweeney introduced himself to the commission. He started with MSW in May and said he’s been busy working on different things, trying to improve the downtown.

“We just launched our 2030 Strategic Plan last Thursday. Pretty well attended public event, over 100 people came, and kind of getting excited about downtown, and now moving forward to implement that plan,” he said.

Traffic Administrator Lance Grubbs said one of Sweeney’s “details” was downtown parking.

“Yes,” Sweeney said. “I work with (City Planner) Justin (Taylor) on that and I’m trying to listen to what people have to say about some of their challenges and bring that forward and coordinate.”

He said what’s good about the plan they just released is that it brought forward a number of the parking recommendations that were contained in the Hyatt-Palmer plan that covered parking and another study.

“We’ll bring those forward. I know Justin’s working on some things and I’ll have some stuff to announce soon on changes to parking, improvements,” Sweeney said. Councilwoman Cindy Dobbins said she knows downtown parking is a big challenge.

“It seems like lately I’ve been receiving more and more people coming to me because people are parked on the street for days at a time and not moving their vehicles. So it’s gotten to be a real issue,” she said. Sweeney said what the city is working on is a way to have more consistent enforcement using technology. It’ll push those long-term parkers on to off-street parking lots.

“Hopefully, when that gets a chance to be implemented, that will help adjust some of that,” he said. There also will be changes to parking fines and fees that will create a deterrence.

“I think that’s important, maybe raising the fees,” Dobbins said.Taylor told Dobbins the Warsaw Common Council will probably have an opportunity soon to act on some of that. “We’ll get some stuff in front of you, and then you’ll be able to make those decisions,” he said.

Warsaw Police Department Capt. Joel Beam said Tuesday they received a complaint of not writing enough parking tickets. The same day, they received a complaint that they were writing too many tickets. The person wasn’t happy with their $10 parking ticket. Dobbins said she sees a lot of tickets being written in the City Hall and Municipal parking lots, but not so many on the streets.

Later in the meeting, Shauna Perkins, who co-owns The Diner with her husband John, told the commission, “The parking downtown is ridiculous. It’s affecting not only my business, but others as well. Part of the problem is that there’s not enough enforcement.

”She said she has two vehicles sitting in front of her business Wednesday that have been there for two days. “The three days before that, it was parked about four spots down on the other side in front of somebody else’s business,” Perkins stated. “I know you said you’ve gotten complaints about too many tickets. I can not possibly imagine it being from somebody downtown. I can’t tell you when the last time was I saw him physically walk around and mark for two-hour parking. I understand he’s been ill. But is there anything in place for while he’s ill and while he’s out?”

Beam said they’ve had Code Enforcement doing parking patrol on top of his job and “that’s what we have to offer.” He said the budget won’t allow for a backup parking patrol officer. “He’s coming back soon.”

Perkins stated there are people parking in spots that aren’t even parking spots. She said she took a photo Tuesday and sent it to the police department. “It’s not just today. It’s every day. It’s something. Like I said, there are cars that have been sitting there for days,” she said.

Taylor said they do have Code Enforcement working on parking, and they can have him pay special attention to the parking in front of The Diner.

“I do want to let you know that I have a meeting with the mayor tomorrow morning to discuss our contract that we have put together and some ordinance rewrites for parking downtown. So that meeting’s happening tomorrow, and then we’re going to start discussing the proposal with the city council over the next few weeks, and then get something in front of them to vote on for the ordinance updates and the contract with a new parking enforcement company that will offer the equipment. We’ll still use our local staff to enforce the parking, but it will streamline the process,” Taylor said.

During the council meetings, there will be opportunities for the public to give feedback. “It’s in the works. We’re getting closer to taking that to the council meetings. We’re just lining up the rest of the paperwork we have to do to get that moving,” Taylor stated.

Perkins said she understands that there is no easy fix, but people are taking advantage of the lax parking patrol. She also pointed out the size of the handicapped parking signs seems to be too small for people to see and a lot of people are parking illegally in the handicapped parking spaces. The painting for the parking spaces also needs touched up.