It took only a holiday weekend for downtown Sarasota business leaders to react, and not positively, to the recently implemented overhaul of the city’s paid parking program.
As an enterprise fund, the goal was to make the city’s Parking Division pay its own way rather than being subsidized by the general fund and the entire city’s tax base. But, at the onset of the July 6 meeting of the Sarasota City Commission, it was restaurateurs and commercial property owners Chris Voelker and Ron Shugar who commented businesses are already paying the price.
On July 1, the commission-approved change in the parking program took affect, which extended hours of enforcement and modestly increased fines rather than hiking the fees to park along Main Street and South Palm Avenue, and in the city’s two downtown parking garages. The changes also applied to paid street parking and the parking garage at St. Armands Circle…