Sag Harbor Village Board Hears Complaints About Paid Parking

A handful of Sag Harbor Village residents appeared before the Village Board on Tuesday to voice their objections to paid parking in the Meadow Street lot behind Schiavoni’s Market and in the neighboring gas ball lot.

April Gornik of North Haven said she found the idea of requiring paid parking in the two lots to be “hideous,” and she added that on social media people are “going berserk” over it.

“I cannot get my head around it,” she said. “It just does not seem like this village. It seems grasping and greedy, and I don’t think that’s our style.”

Mayor Tom Gardella admitted there were problems with the system but promised, “We are going to work together to find a solution.”

Gardella has said he opposes requiring village residents to ever have to pay for parking, and he said he would be willing to include people who live in the village’s fire and ambulance protection districts as well.

The mayor said he had requested that police not issue tickets during the recent HarborFest and American Music Festival weekends, and said he wanted anyone from the village who was ticketed in either lot this summer to let him know.

There would appear to be quite a few residents who have been ticketed, judging by the reaction of people appearing in the village’s Justice Court each week to pay parking fines. Many tell Justice Carl Irace they do not see the signs for paid parking or cannot make the app work on their phones.

Gardella said the village also had to do something to provide parking for workers in businesses on and near Main Street. He said one business owner told him she routinely spends $1,500 to $2,000 each year to cover the cost of employees’ parking tickets.

Trustee Aidan Corish, who has championed paid parking in select places in the village, said, “This was probably not our finest hour” when it rolled out paid parking for the Meadow Street and gas ball lots.

Corish said the board’s goal was to find a source of revenue to offset the cost of leasing and insuring the gas ball lot from developer Adam Potter for an estimated $70,000 per year.

“What we did this summer was a little blunt, to be honest, and we need something more nuanced,” he said.

Paid parking restrictions end for the season on October 15, and Corish said the village would work to have a new plan in place by January.

Stephen Elmaleh, a village resident, said he understood charging for the gas ball lot because the village is leasing it, but he said charging for the Meadow Street lot “seems like a very hostile act” to village residents.

Paul Rogers, who was one of those defendants complaining about village parking rules to Irace earlier in the day, asked the board why it had not issued permits to residents so they wouldn’t have to pay.

Corish said the board was scrambling to put rules in place this summer and simply fell short in its goals. “We failed,” he admitted.

The board also approved a contract with IMEG Consultant Corporation that will pay the firm $8,200 to review and evaluate the bids received by the village to extend sewer lines. The bids, opened September 10, came in well above estimates for the work, and they are only good for 45 days, which only allows for about a week to review them.

The board also accepted the resignation of John Parker as its representative to the East Hampton Town Community Preservation Fund Water Quality Advisory Committee and named Trustee Bob Plumb to take his place. The committee reviews requests for funding for water quality projects, including Sag Harbor’s sewer line expansion project.

The board also received a report from architect Karen Arrigoni, who is a member of the Sag Harbor Partnership, on the condition of the Sag Harbor Fire Museum building. Gardella has made the restoration of the building a priority, and the partnership has offered to help finance the cost of renovating the building.

The board also appointed Susan Hewitt as a member of the Planning Board and Adrian Pickering as an alternative member of the Harbor Committee.