Maximum of 5 hours allowed per vessel
Call it an “Oops” revision.
In early February, the Sarasota city commissioners voted unanimously in calling for the city’s Parking Division to charge $2 per hour for people to use the day docks that have been created within The Bay Park in downtown Sarasota, except on Sundays.
The time limit per slip would be five hours, they also agreed.
Yet, during their May 18 meeting, before Broxton Harvey, general manager of the Parking Division, began his remarks as part of the second reading of the proposed ordinance, City Attorney Joe Polzak offered a comment:
The reason that the item had been placed on the Unfinished Business portion of the session’s agenda, Polzak said, was “because there were substantive changes made between first and second reading.”
To wit: Harvey said that after their initial vote on the fees, he had learned that, because “we received federal funding for the building of the day docks … we are not able to actually charge for fees [for use of them].”
However, he continued, “What we want to do is basically make changes to the ordinance that was going to go forth and keep it at timed restrictions only …” The proposal still called for a five-hour limit, he noted.
Further, Harvey told the commissioners, “We can still impose citations” on violators of that limit.
Interim City Manager Jennifer Jorgensen interjected a clarification at that point: “Just because we got federal funding doesn’t necessarily restrict us.” The situation with the day docks, she continued, is that “when the application was drafted to apply for the federal funding, it was specified in there … that we would not charge fees for the day docks.”
Thus, Jorgensen told the commissioners, “That is why we cannot charge.”
Harvey added that the ordinance still says that “no vessel shall be moored or secured to any dock for longer than a maximum time limit of five hours, consecutively, within a day.”
Further, the original hours when that time limit would have been in place were 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Saturday, Harvey said. The revised ordinance specifies the hours of 5 a.m. until 11 p.m. seven days a week.
Even though the City Commission earlier that day had voted 4-1 to eliminate paid parking enforcement from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Sundays, Harvey recommended that the board members keep the dock usage restriction on Sundays. “The day docks are totally different than parking,” he pointed out.
Users of those slips will not have trailers, he emphasized, “because there’s nowhere for them to park a vehicle” at the day docks.
The ordinance is to go into effect on June 1, he added.
When Mayor Debbie Trice asked whether any of her colleagues had questions about the proposed changes, none did.
Then Vice Mayor Kathy Kelley Ohlrich made a motion to approve the revised ordinance on second reading, and Commissioner Kyle Battie seconded it. The vote was 5-0 in support of the motion.