Parking fees in Newark increased Tuesday.
Rates increased by $1 – to $2 per hour in municipal lots and $2.25 per hour for street meters. The change is a result of the 2023 budget process and the first rate increase since 1999.
Last year, Newark made around $2.5 million from parking fees, and budgeted for around $4.2 million in 2023.
Renee Bensley is the Director of Planning and Development for the city of Newark, and says the city raised parking fees to minimize the increase in property taxes too.
“We are looking to balance our budget through a diverse set of revenue streams and this is part of that," Bensley says. "Because with our property ownership makeup and the university not having property taxes to be paid on the majority of their property, there's concerns at times about the fairness of increases in costs being solely raised through property taxes. So the parking rates are one of our revenue streams that hadn't been addressed in a while.”
Some local businesses have free parking lots for their customers like All in One Smoke Shop on Main Street. But store manager Kevin Siano says a lot of his customers still park out front on the street and just don’t pay the fee.
“They'll grab it and go as fast as possible, which isn't the worst thing ever," Siano says. "But at the same time like if they had the time to sit here for a minute and look around, walk around, who knows, they probably could have bought more stuff or seen something that were actually interested in, but they were in such a rush and didn't want to get a ticket that they just go in and out.”
For anyone that does get a ticket, the base fine rate is discounted by 50% if paid within 15 days of receipt.
Siano says what hurts his business the most is when students are gone and foot traffic is low, especially since the pandemic now that most can take winter and summer session classes online.
Bensley says fees will be halved twice per year from December 16 to January 15 and again June 16 to August 15 when the majority of UD students are not in session. Parking will continue to be free on holidays.
