A budget crunch in Sag Harbor Village that could add 5 percent to spending and result in a 2.6-percent tax increase — and pierce the state-mandated 2-percent cap — has officials on the hunt to save money where they can.
Parking, for one, seems to fit the bill.
In the process, they may end up not just raising the price of resident parking stickers from $15 to $25, but also retooling how employee parking is handled. While some may balk at a roughly 60-percent increase, in actual dollars $10 more is a small increase, board members agreed.
Mayor Thomas Gardella said during a public budget work session on March 18 that the intention would not be to raise prices to make more money, but to cover the costs associated with parking. Included in that cost breakdown is the $70,000 a year the village pays Adam Potter to rent the gas ball property on Bridge Street. That figure also covers insurance on the lot, the mayor said, and there are costs associated with making the stickers themselves.
The village plans to install four new parking kiosks that would work similarly to the ParkMobile app, which will still be available. The village pays 30 cents for every transaction logged on the app.
Sag Harbor offers eight parking lots — two that are free but time-limited, three that are paid, and three long-term. The paid parking lots at Bridge Street and Meadow Street can be accessed by residents with a sticker from the village, while at Long Wharf, where everyone pays to park, the maximum of five hours costs $22. Bridge and Meadow Streets, which have four-hour maximum stays, are capped at $14. The first hour of all the lots comes free of charge.
Last year, village residents were offered two free stickers per household with a third available for $15. Residents of the school district could buy three tickets per household at $15 each. Volunteers with the village ambulance or Fire Department received stickers free of charge.
According to Aidan Corish of the village board, 2,500 stickers were sold last year for a total of $37,500 in revenue.
But what of village employees who don’t live in the village? Sag Harbor last year offered a tag that employees could put on their windshields. Police Chief Robert Drake said the rollout was a “logistics nightmare.”
The village also rented the parking lots at Pierson High School in the hope that employees would park there and walk into the village. Mr. Corish said he drove by frequently, but the parking was often unused. He called the arrangement “not successful.”
Board members discussed the possibility that employers could offer a list of employees who would be provided parking passes for four hours of free parking. For an additional $12 for four hours of paid parking, Mr. Corish said, they could park for an entire eight-hour shift.
Free Ride, a ride-sharing service pitched to the village earlier this year as a way to transport those who parked at Pierson, is still in the mix, Mr. Corish said. The chamber of commerce has offered to contribute to the program, but an amount has not been settled on.
The board may vote on a price increase for resident parking stickers tonight at a discussion of the tentative budget.
