San Bruno tries to rectify its paid parking program 

Councilmembers did opt 2-3 to not move forward with directing staff to investigate the possibility of making Sunday parking free. There is a fiscal component to the decision — Police Chief Ryan Johansen, who heads the troubled endeavor, warned councilmembers that the program could lose around $100,000 in revenue from the decision. 

“As much as I would like to see Sundays be free, I don’t think it would be fiscally responsible,” Councilmember Michael Salazar said. 

Councilmember Tom Hamilton said he chose not to move forward with a free-Sunday program only because it would go against the program’s original goals, which was to incentivize parking turnover in the downtown. Allowing free unlimited lot parking on Sunday would be extremely disruptive and antithetical to those goals, Hamilton said. 

“I truly and sincerely believe this would have a disastrous impact on our program,” Hamilton said after the meeting. “Our program, from the beginning, has been designed to encourage short-term parking on the street and long-term parking on the lots.” 

Vice Mayor Marty Medina and Councilmember Sandy Alvarez voted to look into a free Sunday program. 

But the City Council did direct staff to look into a range of other elements to better the paid parking program. Many of those directions were against the recommendation of staff, who suggested that more data be collected before moving forward with any changes. 

“It’s very frustrating to hear the staff is not recommending any changes,” Alvarez said. “We’ve heard long enough from the public that we need changes on the kiosks, we still hear the kiosks are malfunctioning. We need to make this a priority — the public has waited long enough.” 

That was a complaint reiterated by several residents during the meeting. 

“We’re not getting facts, we’re not getting answers, we’re just saying we need three more months, six more months, and it’s just not working, quite frankly,” resident John Marshall said. 

There was majority concurrence for looking into removing paid parking on El Camino Real north of the San Mateo Avenue and Taylor Avenue intersection — since meters went in it’s been underutilized, Hamilton said. There was also majority support for possibly pursuing enhanced wayfinding and signs to communicate to the public that parking in a lot is substantially cheaper than the street.

In addition, Hamilton said that the City Council is in favor of exploring ways to make it clearer on the kiosks when parking is free, like after hours and on holidays. They were also unanimously in favor of staff identifying new mobile payment options, Hamilton said. 

San Bruno is also running into forthcoming issues with the parking program because it will soon no longer have a designated management team and does not have enough staffing resources, Johansen — who is leaving for a new job in February — said while going over the items up for discussion. 

“While there may be some frustration this evening that there has not been as much movement as some councilmembers may expect on some of these items, please know it is a direct result of that fact that there is no staff to complete staff work that is desired to be done,” he said. 

City staff will conduct a needs analysis to best determine what department will head the program moving forward.