Board of Aldermen 5-21-2020 Page 45
accommodate restaurants so that they have outside seating. So to take the rest of the spaces that are
along the way and make them be take out spots or just the 15 minute spots, | think is a good compromise
measure that also strikes the balance of we don’t want to lose the revenue that we’ve been getting for the
Downtown Improvement Committee and funding a lot of the things that are important to our downtown.
So with all that being said, | was very happy to endorse this Legislation and | think it is a really awesome
piece that came forward from having the type of Community discussions that we have had around this and |
hoe it passes tonight. Thank you.
President Wilshire
Alderman Klee.
Alderman Klee
Thank you, Madam President. And | agree with what Alderman Clemons just stated. | think we are losing
the parking basically on Main Street because we are doing this widening. And | think having this as we saw
earlier in the green areas being the takeout parking and so on, | think it was necessary to put in a 15-
minute parking. | don’t think we should be penalizing someone who is just running in and taking something
out. The key issue also is that plan that we voted on also does not take away any of the handicapped
parking, it still remains and that’s not just limited to 15 minutes, it’s as it always has been. When | look at
the fiscal note of this even though there is a potential of $14,000.00 or $15,000.00 - $57,000.00 lost in
revenue, the next bill has a potential of $100,000.00 to $200,000.00 lost in revenue. | think that you know
this $14,000.00 to $57,000.00 we will be gaining that and what we get for the businesses and so on.
The other one taking it a little bit further for me is just and then the taxpayers are going to have to pick that
bill up and we are not supporting downtown. And there’s | think $758,000.00 that have gone to into the
General Fund. This should not hurt that; the other one could truly have a negative effect on it but | won’t
talk about that. | am very much for this and considering we have already voted for the narrowing; this just
enhances that and helps because many businesses — I’ve been to a lot of those business/economic
meetings. Many of the businesses said that with this pandemic they are really upping their takeout and
they’ve noticed more and more of it. And that was one their concerns, that they were going to lose that
business because people wouldn't have a place to stop.
So when they developed this plan, they very, very carefully made sure that they put in this take out parking
or this 15-minute parking. It also allows for quick deliveries too. So | truly stand by this and | am proud to
be an endorser of it. Thank you.
President Wilshire
Alderman Lopez.
Alderman Lopez
Yeah so first of all | want to, | mean what | don’t want to know is how badly this is going to hurt the parking
study because we are going to have to tackle that eventually. But this is an opportunity again where you
know you have a forced change to pilot out different models of things that may or may not work. | think
based on what the public health department is thinking and medical professionals, this is going to be, the
COVID-19 epidemic is going to impact our life until next winter, which is like the dead season downtown.
And then likely, into the beginning of the spring too, even if we create a vaccine that doesn’t mean it is
distributed. So | think we are doing the right thing be encouraging creative thinking and approaches to
problem solving.
