Sechelt’s finance, culture and economic development committee is recommending a return to fees for daytime parking at the Porpoise Bay Wharf.
The daily parking fee was dropped in 2014, and the district has been charging only to leave vehicles overnight. A staff report for the committee’s Nov. 8 meeting suggested the daily parking rate of $3 for vehicles and $6 for vehicles with trailers be reinstated starting on Jan. 1, 2018.
Coun. Darren Inkster supported the move. “When that fee was in place a number of years ago, the money that came from the parking that we put into the docks and the parking lot led in a very clear way to some federal government funding … because the district demonstrated a financial commitment to those docks,” he said.
Coun. Doug Wright also backed a return to paid daytime parking, as long as it comes with a plan for proper enforcement. “If you’re going to collect a fee you need to do it in the most efficient way possible and having a staff member going down there to check parking, once in the morning, once at noon hour, and once at the end of the day, is just not cost effective.”
One of the reasons given for dropping the fee in 2014 was to assist the Lighthouse Pub with parking. The pub’s original licence required it to provide 77 parking spots, but there were only 62 available on the property. The district agreed to share 15 spots on its lot, but according to staff there was never any discussion of the spots remaining free of charge.
The committee also asked staff for a broader report on revenues and cost-recovery strategies for the entire Porpoise Bay Wharf operation.
