Parking Authority Wants Higher Fees For Resident Permits
By Mike Dunn
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- City officials are poised to raise the cost of renewing residential parking permits, which are used in more than two dozen neighborhoods throughout Philadelphia.
Renewing a residential parking permit now costs $20 per year -- a fee that was set back in 1992.
City Council's Streets Committee has now agreed to the Parking Authority's request to raise the annual renewal to $35, matching the fee for a first-time applicant.
Richard Dickson, the Parking Authority's deputy executive director, says even the higher fee does not cover the program's costs.
"The fees that we collect from this program don't come close to covering the cost of operating the program, of processing applications, printing permits, mailing permits out, enforcement officers to enforce the blocks. So this is an effort to try to recoup some of the money that's lost as a result of this program," he said.
Dickson says another change is that families who want permits for more than one car will face higher annual fees for additional cars -- $50 for a second vehicle, $75 for a third, and $100 each beyond the third.
"We think that it is appropriate that if a household is taking more than one space on a street, that there should be some additional fee required in order to do that," Dickson said.
Currently there thirty parking districts throughout the city, and 33,000 permits are issued each year. Dickson says about ten percent of those households have more than one car.
A final vote on the fee hike by the full Council is expected in October.
