Council Grumbles Over Park District Meters, Park District Says It's a Done Deal

By Kevin Robinson in News on Aug 19, 2009 2:00PM

On Tuesday, the City Council called on Tim Mitchell, Daley's Superintendent of Parks, to answer questions about the District's plans to install parking meters at city beaches this fall. The Park District will contract with Standard Parking to manage the meters, which will charge users a dollar an hour for parking at city beaches. In July 38th Ward Alderman Tom Allen expressed outrage at the deal, saying "The slogan is, 'Come out and play' —not 'come out and pay.' We want to revisit this. People own the lakefront. People own the beach. In this economy, that's the only vacation people can afford."

Mitchell said that aldermen only complained after the blowback from the city's own botched parking meter deal. "The way we view it here is adding a small fee that will impact those actually using the service — in this case, about $1-an-hour to park at the beach — is better than having a property tax increase," Mitchell told the council Tuesday, noting that the Park District has resisted raising property taxes for the last four years.

The district hopes to raise about $1 million dollars by charging for parking. 49th Ward Alderman Joe Moore says that he'll use his ward stipend to stave off the meters at Leone and Loyola Parks. For the rest of the city, though, free parking at more than 4,400 spaces will end in about four to six weeks.