Parking by Oversized Vehicles to be Outlawed on Public Streets Come 2015, Albany City Council Decides

Discussion of an ordinance to limit oversized and recreational vehicle parking within city limits dominated Tuesday's City Council meeting, as many residents aired concerns about the need to crack down on such parking in Albany.

The Council ultimately voted to adopt an ordinance to prohibit these vehicles from parking on public streets. There are a handful of exemptions, and residents who own these vehicles will be able to keep parking them, via a permit, until July 2015. 

"I'm shocked this finally happened," said Albany resident Jan Hitchcock, about the council's adoption of the ordinance. She said she has watched the discussion move forward at a snail's pace, but had come to Tuesday's meeting because the last meeting on the topic made a decision appear imminent. Though she has long wanted to see restrictions on such vehicles, she said she wasn't satisfied with the ordinance.

"We've prostituted ourselves for fees," she said. Hitchcock, who lives near Dartmouth Street and Stannage Avenue, said during the meeting that RVs would be better off in parking lots, rather than on city streets. "They're eyesores and they're a safety issue. Do we just make money off of them?"

Views from members of the public and council members ran the gamut, from expressions that oversized vehicles, such as 40-foot RVs, be largely outlawed, to hopes that the city would allow local owners of such vehicles to keep parking them indefinitely by acquiring a permit. 

The ordinance has been before the Traffic & Safety Commission for some time, and was sparked by concerns from citizens about visual nuisance and safety problems created by the parking of such vehicles throughout the city, but especially on Dartmouth, Cleveland and Masonic avenues and Key Route Boulevard, according to the July 6 staff report on parking.

Resident Ray Anderson advocated not punishing law-abiding citizens who own RVs by making it impossible to park in town, and resident John Kindle pointed out that the main reason for the ordinance was to limit parking by people who don't live in Albany, and who park huge RVs or boats and fail to move them regularly. Kindle, who said he camps twice a month and has an RV that he moves religiously every three days, said the closest legal parking lot he could find, in Milpitas, charges $250 a month. 

"I would pay $100 a month to the city," to park on his block, he said, "I ask that you look at that option."

Albany residents who currently own oversized or recreational vehicles will be able to park them on their block until July 1, 2015, if they buy a city permit. But permits will not be issued for any vehicles purchased after July 1, 2010. And, after 2015, these vehicles will not be allowed to park on public streets.

Resident Francesco Papalia said he found the ordinance overly broad, and that it penalizes everyone rather than simply targeting those who sleep in their campers or park "three boats in the street." He said that, while it's true RVs are not fuel efficient, someone who drives around and vacations in them may well be using less carbon than another person who jets around in airplanes.  

"We throw these things around without the understanding of the life cycle of what we do," he said. "The best thing that we do is to understand how we, individually, use our resources from when we get up in the morning until we go to bed. Using what we have well is the most important thing."

Everyone seemed to agree that, for safety reasons, these vehicles should not be allowed to park within 100 feet of street corners.

The City Council also adopted a Living Wage Ordinance that will not have any financial impact on the budget this year, as everyone affected by the ordinance already makes more than its bottom line.

Six part-time seasonal positions were considered for inclusion in the ordinance, but this raised a number of complex questions that could not be answered or agreed upon. Rather than vote on a decision that could have cost the city up to $73,200, the council decided to leave out the group for possible consideration at a later date. 

Thirty-three people work in those positions, including six crossing guards and 27 employees for Parks and Recreation.

Residents Brian Parsley and Peggy McQuaid expressed concern that raising wages could cause departments to cut some programs and workers altogether. 

"My main concern is that by including at this time all employees, seasonal and part time, we may end up hurting people we are trying to help," said Parsley, who sits on the Social & Economic Justice Commission.

Councilman Rober Lieber argued that the city should treat all of its employees with equity rather than focus on the money, and that arguing against including the part-time workers was an argument for relying on low-wage positions.

"If we can't afford to pay someone a living wage, we can't afford that work," he said. "I don't think we should be balancing our budget on our lowest paid workers.... I want our city to be judged by what we do in hard times, not what we do in fat times."

The council approved an implementation plan for the city's Climate Action Plan, which was approved in March. The plan is an attempt to reduce emissions to 25 percent below 2004 levels by 2020. It includes 40 measures to reduce greenhouse gases. The implementation plan sets a time line for those reductions.

Fire Chief Marc McGinn spoke briefly but passionate in favor of a new ordinance to require photoelectric, rather than ionization, smoke alarms within city limits for projects involving new construction, renovation and in several other cases.

The latter are cheaper, he explained, but have been shown to take much to longer to sound than the former. Some ionization alarms, 20 percent, he said, never sound at all. 

Council members voted unanimously to adopt the ordinance.

In other news, Beth Pollard, the official formerly known as city administrator, received the improved title of city manager (though her job duties, at this point, won't change); the city will fix Catherine's Walk with money saved in the Community Center tower repair; and the city adopted, for second reading, a prohibition of public alcohol consumption.

The open container ordinance will be the city's first. 

See all the staff reports and additional materials from the July 6 City Council meeting online.