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Sanibel Council adjusts parking sticker fees

By Staff | Sep 28, 2016

Although the Sanibel City Council agenda was light last Tuesday, there was one significant item the council had to consider: an emergency ordinance regarding parking stickers.

City attorney Ken Cuyler said the council would have to make a motion to set the emergency ordinance and vote for it with an 80 percent margin, which it did unanimously.

Once the ordinance passed it would then have to be brought back to city council to go through the regular procedure, which means a public notice and first reading in October and a vote in November. Otherwise, the ordinance is repealed.

Cuyler said such a situation is unusual, but it happens from time to time.

Mayor Kevin Ruane said the sticker fees hadn’t been touched since 2008 and motioned to approve the 10 percent increase of the “B” stickers from $90 to $99. And the “BC” stickers, which is used for the boat ramps, from $180 to $198.

The sale of “B” stickers has increased nearly 50 percent since 2013 and has nearly tripled for “BC” stickers, although their sales this year was only 24 as of May 31.

During public comment, Mike Miller said the city council didn’t go far enough, saying the sticker price should correlate more with the hourly rate.

Cuyler also discussed the procedure regarding the continuance of the final budget hearing that was originally set for Tuesday, but pushed back to Wednesday, so as to not conflict with the Lee County budget hearing.

The city council (or at least a quorum) would have to convene at 5:01 p.m. Tuesday and immediately motion to continue the hearing to Wednesday at the same time.

In other business, two council members had some concerns regarding the food trucks coming to town in association with the Sanibel Captiva Conservation Foundation “Beer in the Bushes” event on April 15, 2017.

Mick Denham was ready to approve it, but expressed concern about the need to allow a proliferation of the trucks for special events.

“It’s not in keeping with the Sanibel vision, I don’t think. How do we allow this and not allow all the other events we have?” Denham asked.

The explanation was the city council has the right to approve having food trucks as well as the number of them on an individual event basis.

“I’m concerned that a smaller group with less land would try to get more and this group has adequate land and it is a good group that does a lot for the community. We can try it once and if there’s a problem we can look at it again,” Jim Jennings said.

The concerns allayed, the consent agenda item was passed unanimously.

The council also passed a resolution to support the Everglades for the Next Generation Act, which includes emergency funding to repairs on the Herbert Hoover Dike, the Everglades Land Acquisition Act of 2016 and the Federal Partnership for Clean Water Land Acquisition Act of 2016.