Chief Scott, ParkMobile, and The New Parking Squad

Chief Scott takes flack for his changes to Jenkintown parking enforcement which may make the deficit worse.

The issue of parking in Jenkintown continues to rage in council meetings and on online discussions. No matter where you go, no one thinks they have enough parking. In older towns like Jenkintown, it’s especially contentious because most of our streets were laid out when people still rode horses, trains, and trolleys.

Three new developments have stirred the pot in this town. First, Jenkintown’s three new parking enforcement officers have replaced recently retired Linda Bennet. Second, the ParkMobile app will replace the parking meters. Third, the Borough has created a new parking permit scheme. While all three have caused many residents no small measure of confusion and frustration, we’ll save the permit scheme for a later article.

New Parking Sheriffs in Town

At the April Borough Council meeting, Chief Thomas Scott both commemorated the retirement of long-time parking officer Linda Bennett and welcomed her three replacements. The new officers promptly struck out across the borough citing every violation they could find, including those that haven’t been ticketed in decades — if ever.

Then on May 22nd, Council member David Ballard relayed a message from Chief Scott via his personal account to the Jenkintown Community Page announcing the Chief’s intention to fully enforce the parking regulations. There would be no warnings and no grace period.

“One of those violations is the parking against the flow of traffic (opposite direction of the flow of traffic). The officers will be citing any vehicle that is parked in the opposite direction of the flow of traffic.” 

Shortly afterwards, social media lit up again with complaints about the sudden enforcement of not only this law, but other rarely enforced prohibitions on parking at yellow-painted corners and making quick stops in no-parking zones. In fact, in our experience, the Borough rarely issued parking tickets outside of the business district or on any streets without meters or residential parking restrictions. 

As a result of the backlash, the JPD forgave many tickets, at a cost not only to the budget, but also the chief’s reputation. Borough Council also failed to address his PR mess.

To be clear, we do not suggest that the Chief not do his job, but we do think his tactics speak to a lack of sensitivity towards the people he now serves.

In 2018, Borough Council discussed the ongoing parking violations on Walnut Street where residents habitually parked their cars deep into the sidewalk space for fear of sideswiping. Foolishly, Council put itself on record saying it could not enforce the law, leaving the Borough open to litigation for violating the Americans with Disabilities Act. 

When informed of this by a resident, Chief DiValentino issued warnings to the owners of those vehicles, which immediately solved the problem. That’s what needed to happen here. 

What also needed to happen was an announcement with reminders issued on all official Borough channels on Facebook, its website, and to its email list, and not on David Ballard’s personal Facebook account. This is Transparency 101. 

ParkMobile — Digital Convenience at Double the Cost

Because the Borough’s bank of record no longer accepts coins, Chief Scott has pressed the Borough to enter parking’s digital age. From the broad selection of parking systems available, the Borough picked ParkMobile to administer the collection of parking fees. Already, our borough has ParkMobile zones in the town center and near the train station.

As a result, the price of parking at a metered space has doubled, from 50 cents to one dollar per hour. Given how these things work, we suspect that ParkMobile receives most of that increase. ParkMobile also provides the ability for the Borough to raise or lower fees based on demand.

ParkMobile claims to serve more than 600 municipalities across the country, and it does have its advantages. Users enjoy the convenience of paying by credit card, the ability to monitor their remaining time, and to remotely refill the “meter” from their smartphone.

Parking apps also have some annoying disadvantages. You might get to your destination but find you have trouble logging into the app. Or your credit card expired since you last used the app. Or you’ve parked in the pouring rain and you can’t find your zone number. Or that ParkMobile tracks your location. Or that you’ve just given your personal information to yet another potential hacker target.

For those who do not use smartphones, the Borough has not made accommodations for you. ParkMobile’s site suggests users may make a payment by via a toll-free number:

“Each area of the country has a regionally specific toll-free number to dial in to the automated voice response system to start your parking sessions quickly and easily. The toll-free number is shown on ParkMobile signs and/or stickers posted on the meter, pay stations and other signage in the area where you’d like to park.”

Unfortunately, the ParkMobile website does not provide instructions for setting up an account without the app or whether or not you need an account before making the call.

We expect a generational divide over acceptance of this new system, but — again — the Borough could help these residents by keeping them better informed about their options. They have the tools to do so and three council members per ward to help spread the word.

The Parking Deficit

Will any of these new developments bring the borough more revenue? According the the Borough’s 2023 budget, it collected $171,841 in fines and fees associated with parking — $132,000 coming from the meters. It spent $107,265 to pay one parking enforcement officer and to maintain parking infrastructure. That initially shows a surplus of $64,576. Delving deeper into what Jenkintown actually pays for enforcement, infrastructure, and debt service flips the script.

In 2023, enforcement collected $27,266 in fines. Assuming Ms. Bennet made at least the same hourly rate as her successors, her efforts covered a little more than half of her salary.

This year, the Borough hired two new parking enforcement officers while the Chief’s administrative assistant also works the parking beat. The two new PEOs work part time at $20 per hour, for a yearly total almost $62,400. The administrative assistant, listed as “clerk” in the budget, is a full-timer and draws a salary of $48,562.

Because the Borough employees are not required to submit time sheets, we can only guess how much time the assistant spends processing tickets, but given its value to the Borough, we can assume it’s a substantial part of her week.

These salaries do not include benefits, which are not individually cited in the budget. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, benefits make up between 21 and 35 percent of an employee’s total compensation depending on industry, vocation, and location. Splitting the difference at 28%, that adds another $24,000 for an estimated cost for parking enforcement of $110,400.

These parking costs also do not account for:

• The amortized cost of or the interest paid for the Leedom Street parking lot, purchased and developed for more than $2.4 million in 2009.
• The opportunity cost of precluding the sale and development of the Leedom Street lot. A four or five-story commercial building could generate about $200,000 in annual property taxes alone.
• The $3,500 the Borough pays to Glanzmann for rental of the former Stutz’s property on Cedar for parking.

How the equation changes with ParkMobile remains unknown until we receive a right-to-know response. Meanwhile, credit card, service, and convenience fees charged by ParkMobile could eat up nearly half the rate increase.

Assuming the borough sees no increase in the use of — or creation of more — metered spaces, the new system could send approximately $60,000 to ParkMobile’s HQ in Atlanta, Georgia and to the credit card issuers every year. That’s a lot of lost revenue for Borough businesses.

One reasonably wonders how much the Borough could potentially save by simply by getting out of the parking business altogether, and even more if it sold off the Leedom street lot to a private developer. It might pay the salary and benefits of at least one police officer.

This article originally miscalculated the annual wages of the PEOs. We have corrected that error.