Snafu with Parking Deck Means No Free Parking for Monday's Council Meeting

People attending City Council meetings are supposed to be able to park for free in the parking deck behind the new library. However, an oversight on Monday found many people having to pay to get out of that parking deck.

Seventeen people were forced to pay the $6 parking-deck exit fee early Tuesday morning after the council meeting ran long according to Oscar Delgado, Director of Public Works.

“It was never our intention to make people pay to come to council meetings,” said Delgado.

, Delgado said they printed up about 300 validation tickets for council meeting. Those follow-up validation tickets, which are slowly being depleted, provide free parking until midnight on nights when the council meets. Most council meetings end well before midnight.

, ending at 1:35 a.m. The council agenda had two controversial items – the and the proposed slated for the old Tower Records site – which consumed the majority of the meeting time.

“[Monday night’s meeting] was one of those rare meetings that no one caught,” Delgado said. “No one in the parking office considered that it would run past midnight.”

About 50 people were in the audience after midnight, there for the council’s fur-free hearing. That discussion started about 11:40 p.m.; the final vote to approve the fur-free ordinance didn’t occur until 1:20 a.m.

In spite of the validation ending at midnight, some people were able to exit the parking deck for free after midnight with the follow-up tickets. Others were not.

“Some people got out [of the deck] as late as 1:37 according to our [computer] log,” Delgado said.

He’s unsure why those people were able to exit the parking deck using the validated follow-up tickets and others weren’t.

The city will reimburse anyone who had to pay to get out of the parking deck.

“We can process a refund if they were overcharged,” said Delgado. “Just come to City Hall with the ticket.”

Starting in October when the council meetings move next door to the new council chambers on the ground floor of the new library, the city will use no longer use the follow-up tickets for free parking in the deck.

Instead, they’ll use a computerized system where the ticket is scanned and the validation is registered in the system. Delgado said the scanner will be located at the council deputies’ desk.

As for the held Tuesday night in West Hollywood Park, even though it was a city-sponsored event, free parking was not provided.

Delgado said that no one in City Hall came to the parking department requesting it provide validation for the DADT event. Thus anyone attending that march and rally who parked in the parking deck had to pay $6 to exit.

Delgado also reported that 99 percent of the parking meters on the Westside of town are free after 6 p.m.

Follow West Hollywood Patch on Twitter and Facebook for more updates, tips and news.