A Revenue Enhancer

Charging Non-Long Beach Residents To Park In & Adjacent To City Parks Could Raise Revenues

Living directly across from El Dorado, I have the wonderful treat of looking out on trees, lots of trees and open space. Long Beach should be very proud of its parks and how they are filled with families on the weekends and especially at holidays.

Today, El Dorado was filled up with families celebrating the 4th of July. BBQ's were blazing, kids screaming with laughter, and blankets spread out under the wonderful, large trees.

After sunset (during my usual walk in the park), I noticed mounds of garbage strewned throughout the park and the restrooms were filthy and the toilets clogged.

Now I am not suggesting that all of the aftermath was caused by non-Long Beach residents but it has struck me that anyone can use these parks, whether they paid property taxes in this City or whether or not they even live in this City. And afterwards, the City picks up the tab to clean and maintain these parks.

So why not raise a little revenue from those non-Long Beach residents who use our parks and facilities? That's right. Issue a free parking sticker to every resident of Long Beach (through the utility bills) which could be displayed on the back bumper. Then we could install parking meters on the streets adjacent to the parks and inside the parks. Residents with stickers would be exempt from paying for parking. Non-residents would have to pay for parking at the meters or could pay for an annual parking sticker with an appropriate annual parking fee.

The revenue raised from non-Long Beach residents could be used to defray the costs of park maintenance and park rangers.