On Tuesday, the Ogden City Council is set to consider the implementation of managed parking and associated fees in parts of downtown, including Historic 25th Street and the WonderBlock parking garages, during its Tuesday night meeting.

Ogden City Communications Director Mike McBride told the Standard-Examiner on Monday that managed parking has been discussed by the city since 2020 when a consultant did a parking utilization study for the city.

“At the time, the study revealed that we have enough parking to satisfy the demand downtown, but what it did indicate was that over time, with growth projections and where we’re nearly at right now, that utilization would show a managed system is, in fact, needed in the downtown corridor because there quite simply will be more people and more vehicles than parking stalls.”

He said this came to a head in 2023 when the WonderBlock project was initiated.

“Three years ago, the prior administration adopted a resolution to accept a bond to build the WonderBlock,” he said. “This is inherited work for this mayor … and even at the time, he was the sole City Council member to vote, ‘no.'”

McBride noted that now that the project is becoming a reality, a managed parking system is required.

“We have an inherited project now here at this point,” he said. “A covenant of the bond that was voted on is that the city would implement a managed parking system downtown.”

An attempt to implement paid parking in downtown in 2024 led to Ogden Mayor Ben Nadolski opting to press pause on the effort due to public backlash to try and build a consensus among businesses and the public before another attempt would be launched.

However, some business owners and employees in downtown say they haven’t seen enough.

Among them is Angie van Leer, a chocolatier at Lene’ Marie Chocolates on 25th Street.

“We just found out very recently that Ogden City was going to be implementing their paid parking system, not only for customers, but also for employees, business owners and everybody,” she said. “It was a surprise. We mobilized the next day to talk to everybody. We started a petition and did everything that we did. The public response is overwhelmingly, ‘We don’t want this.’ And I know business owners, especially the small ones. It’s not good for their business.”

Van Leer said their business has only been in operation for about a year and a half, opening after the last attempt at implementing paid parking.

“I do believe there is a solution for everybody to work together and figure this out, but I think the city going about and making paid parking right now is not the right way,” she said. “But I do think that there does potentially need to be some sort of — for events — paid parking to pay back the bond.”

She noted that other business owners have also circulated petitions, gathering over 1,000 signatures each from business owners, employees and residents opposing the plan.

McBride said after the last attempt, one of the key considerations came down to employee parking.

“That’s built into this new system,” he said. “It’s not in the parking garage, but it’s in Electric Alley which is the parking area that flanks 25th Street just to the north from the 100-200 block. All of that will be zoned for employee parking at $10 per month.”

He said that the original proposal would’ve been up to $50 per month for employees.

McBride said that getting the permit would come down to the employer.

“It’s going to be a relationship between the employee and business manager,” he said. “It’ll be a decision the business itself makes. I think in some cases, the employee may absorb the $10 cost per month, and I think in many cases, the business will elect to manage that for them.”

However, van Leer noted that the $10 may not stay at that level.

“It’s $10 per month to begin,” she said. “They could jack that at any time if anybody needs to hire extra staff for the Christmas season. This could get ugly.”

She said she doesn’t think employees should have to essentially pay to be able to work downtown.

“Anybody that works on 25th Street should be able to go to their job and park for free,” she said. “Anybody should be able to go to their job and park by their store for free.”

McBride said they’ve heard a variety of feedback to the proposal.

“Most business owners acknowledge there is a parking problem,” he said. “People are camped out, long-term when they could be parked somewhere else for a long term creating space for their patrons. The key feedback that we’ve heard from businesses while we were doing stakeholder outreach — and this is dozens and dozens of stakeholder outreach opportunities — was that they wanted to make sure their employees were taken care of.”

Van Leer said she believes a solution involves being more strict on ticketing and towing along 25th Street and that employees should be able to park for free and have a safe walking commute back to their cars.

“I would really encourage Ogden City to put some paid parking implementations in place for things like the Twilight Concerts, the Farmer’s Market, when a train comes into Union Station,” she said. “The high traffic events. Recover the money there, because people will come.”

McBride said that controversy around going to a paid parking system isn’t a surprise.

“We knew that nobody was going to outwardly be a champion for paid or managed parking,” he said. “The goal, all along, has been to help people just understand why. If we can get people to the point where they say, ‘This makes sense that they need to manage this system because of XYZ reasons,’ to me, that’s a good communications win. Not necessarily having them celebrate or anything like that, but just to understand there’s smart-growth reasoning behind this.”

Van Leer noted she has been approached by members of the Ogden City Council as well as the mayor to discuss the issue.

“I believe a true compromise means nobody’s truly happy; however, I would like everybody to be just a little bit more satisfied,” she said. “I do want the city to be paid back. I don’t want to pay to go to work.”