Merchants Ask County Board's Assistance With Downtown Parking

Send a link to a friend

[November 16, 2007]  Merchants from downtown Lincoln attended Thursday night's county board meeting to ask the for the board's assistance with an increasing problem: parking on the square. Business owners and managers from Serendipity, Abe's Carmelcorn, MKS Jewelry, Beans and Such, and The Treasure Chest were present.

David Lanterman of Beans and Such led the discussion. He said that since the employee access moved to the west side of the courthouse, county employees have been observed continuously parking all day on the square. Everyone has a moment when they might park there; that is not a problem. But there are a number of county employees who are treating it as though it were their own private parking, he said.

On a positive note, he said that there are more county employees who want to do the right thing. They'll walk to the all-day parking areas. We'd like to recognize those people, he said.

The merchants look at parking as a means to generate revenue by sales taxes for this city and for this county. Employees of the county are paid in part by tax revenue. An employee parking in a space hinders sales and tax revenue, he said.

Lanterman said that he'd been to the city to discuss the matter. And they are doing things.

"Can you work on it?" he asked.

"We're losing business," Lanterman pointed out. "You lose taxes. We'd really like to see you do something."

He said that he asks his employees to park elsewhere and feels that if they don't want to do that, they don't have to be his employee.

Officeholders hire their own employees. John Stewart, vice chairman of the county board, said that he would send a letter to all the departments and ask them to address the parking with their employees.

[to top of second column]

A realtor present said that she had a client interested in opening a natural foods store. She thought it would do well downtown, where merchants support one another. The client responded that they wouldn't go downtown because they'd have no parking. There's a stereotype forming like a little black cloud over our heads, she said, and we "need to work on that."

Several board members suggested that parking enforcement might help the matter and that it would be much more effective if a parking ticket had a little more bite than the current $3, which increases slightly if paid late. It was suggested that amounts of $10, $25 or $50 would get violators' attention.

It was recognized that there are other contributors to the problem, but the merchants wanted to stick to just what the county could do for its part.

Dick Logan, board chairman, said that when employees are hired they are asked to park a block off the square.

Stewart said he thought that if there is an actual need, there are spaces available for county employees to use at the John Logan Building.

Luster said that it would be nice if the officeholders could try to get this straightened out because we want people to come to our town, we want money, and we want our merchants to be happy.

[By JAN YOUNGQUIST]

< Top Stories index

Back to top