Police to keep downtown parking in check

By ROGER G. SMITH
CITY HALL REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- Owner Barry Silver has been watching Federal Plaza and the nearby downtown street for 30 years through the big display windows of his Silver's Vogue Shop.
He's never become frustrated enough to complain about illegal parking, however, until now.
"Within the last year it's just gotten out of hand," he said.
Nearby, Sooyoung Jo, owner of Two Guys Clothing on Federal Street for 18 years, agrees.
He and Silver say they see the same thing every day lately: Certain cars and trucks parked in front of the same parking meters, handicap spots or no-parking zones all day, with never a ticket under the windshield wiper.
It all adds up to preferential treatment for certain police officers, business owners and a few people with handicap parking tags, Silver said, and he's tired of it.
"What's right is right," he said. "Nobody is better than anybody else downtown."
Chief's admission
Police Chief Robert Bush Jr. admits that parking enforcement downtown probably has been lax lately. He wouldn't deny that some people, including police, might have been spared tickets, either.
All that stops Monday, however, he said.
Authorities will ticket any vehicles illegally parked downtown, Bush said.
Authorities left warnings on illegally parked vehicles downtown at the end of last week, said Lt. Robin Lees, police spokesman.
Police officers and the city's parking enforcement company, AMPCO, have been told to ticket any violations starting Monday, he said.
That means vehicles at expired meters, vehicles of downtown workers who feed meters without moving their cars as required by law, drivers who are disabled who park all day on the plaza instead of observing the two-hour limit, and police. Police who have been parking illegally will get tickets and face discipline if they don't stop, he said.
Parking deck closed
Lees said illegal parking downtown bloomed when a private parking deck on Boardman Street across from city hall closed about a year ago. Demolition started in March and the surface lot that replaces it was just paved but isn't yet open.
Police officers and others who used the deck started using shortcuts to keep their cars near Federal Plaza, he said. "It swelled out into the streets," Lees said.
The police department's lack of enforcement probably amounted to tacit approval of the illegal parking, he said.
Lees said nobody complained until now, but that Silver is right and that something has to change.
"He has a valid complaint and we're going to remedy that," Lees said. "We're going to fix it as best we can."
Businessman's view
Silver said he hopes police do what they say and provide long term, consistent enforcement.
Silver said he parks his own car in a deck where he pays a monthly fee and walks a few blocks to work. Jo pays a monthly fee to park in a lot a few blocks away, too.
Yet, others downtown seem to think they are owed parking on the street near their businesses, they said.
It's not just business owners, either, they say.
Police cars on street, extended meter parking and abuse of the plaza's handicap spots compound the problem, they say.
Meanwhile, Silver and Jo said their customers can't find parking spots and it's hurting their already struggling businesses.
"Who's going to park here? Who's going to come?" Jo asked. "This is terrible. We're trying to survive."