The City Council this week approved amendments to four parking-related contracts. The services were for license plate reading technology, parking citations, permitting, and pay stations.
The vote was unanimous. (For details about each of the four contracts, see the story below)
All four contracts were originally on the Consent Calendar. Consent items are voted on collectively and not discussed unless a council member or staff has an item pulled for separate consideration. However, District Three Councilwoman Lisa Landau asked that all four items be pulled from the Consent Calendar.
After the meeting, Landau said she pulled them because she wanted clarification and cited the fact that parking is a hot issue right now.
(In related news, the Sept. 27 meeting of the Ad Hoc Parking Committee was held after the Sun’s print production deadline. News from that meeting will appear in the Oct. 5 issue.)
Following a brief presentation from Capt. Nick Nicholas of SBPD Support Services, the council voted approval of the four contracts.
Council discussion
City Manager Jill Ingram suggested that since all four items were parking related, she would have Nicholas give the staff presentation. “If it’s your pleasure, you can take one vote on the four items,” Ingram said.
“Is that the pleasure of the council?” asked District Two Council Member/Mayor Tom Moore.
No one objected.
According to Nicholas, all four items were for extensions of contracts with vendors that the city has worked with for many years.
He said that after technological improvements were provided by these vendors, Seal Beach was awarded the Parking Today Technical Innovation Award. Nicholas said Seal Beach was the first West Coast city to win the award.
Nicholas said that without these contracts, the SBPD would be unable to provide a high level of service to the community and the city would not have won that award without the services.
“There’s no turnkey solution to parking,” Nicholas said, in response to a comment from District Five Councilman Nathan Steele.
“Seal Beach is unique for a hundred different reasons,” Nicholas said.
He said the city uses all of these vendors to create a comprehensive parking solution for Seal Beach.
District Three Councilwoman Lisa Landau asked about license plate reading technology.
“Does parking go up and down every street or are they restricted to going up and down Main Street and incoming vehicles into the city?”
“Our parking control officers are dual-purpose,” Nicholas said. He said they are sometimes parking officers, sometimes animal control officers. He said sometimes they respond to cold calls for service, sometimes they provide patrol checks.
“They provide a variety of services to the community,” Nicholas said.
He said when they are not assisting with animal control or towing a car, their primary duties are parking enforcement.
“The great thing about having the automated license plate reader system is that regardless of where they drive in the city that collects data and will also alert them to any vehicle violations,” Nicholas said.
“No, it’s not just Main Street, it’s really on every street in the city,” Nicholas said.
Landau asked if someone parked for more than 72 hours on city side streets, would the license plate readers pick that up and track how long they have been there?
Nicholas said if a car is parked for more than 36 hours, that will pop up on the parking enforcement officer’s computer.
Landau asked if Data Ticket, Inc., provided the hand held units that “spit out” citations.
Nicholas said that was correct. He said the Data Ticket software connects with the license plate reader cameras and automatically attach the photo to the citation as well.
Landau also asked about the Parkeon, Inc., pay stations. Landau said there were sometimes issues with the pay stations in the First Street parking lot.
“Have we thought of putting Wi-Fi boosters down there?” she asked.
“I’ve been there when there’s people lined up and they can’t get the thing to work and they get a $64 ticket,” she said.
She asked what could be done to give residents and visitors a better experience.
Nicholas said that was a valid concern.
Nicholas said portions of the beach lots are below sea-level, which creates all kinds of connectivity issues.
“The other thing is that the wireless connectivity is always dependent on the wireless network,” Nicholas said.
He also said that the connectivity depends on the network. He pointed out that sometimes wireless calls get dropped.
He didn’t know if there was a perfect solution that would work 100% of the time.
“We’re looking at other options, including hard-wiring the pay stations as well,” he said.
Steele asked if the license plate reading system stored the data. He asked if the data was available to the council.
Nicholas said the only data stored is the license plate number and the location of the vehicle.
Steele wanted to know if the data showed how many cars were parked on Main Street in a given time frame or if they were on Eighth Street or another street.
Nicholas said that was correct.
“That’s the benefit of having those cameras on all the time, even if the parking enforcement officer is not responding to a parking call or conducting parking enforcement, is that we’re able to leverage that the data that’s collected to inform and make other decisions,” Nicholas said.
Steele asked if the city had come to the point yet that Seal Beach can issue violations without getting out of the car.
“No, because the California Vehicle Code still requires us to place a paper ticket on the windshield of each vehicle,” Nicholas said.
He said now the parking officer will drive down the block, all the violation information will be sent to the officer’s hand held device already filled out and then the parking enforcement officer can walk back up the block, verify that the car is illegally parked, and print out the ticket.
District Four Council Member Schelly Sustarsic asked if the contracts had all started in 2018.
Nicholas said that was correct.
Sustarsic said if she remembered parking consultant Julie Dixon’s data correctly, the data started in 2020 or 2021. Sustarsic asked if there was any way of looking at the prior data that was collected.
Nicholas said he would have to speak with Dixon about why that data was not available.
He said he would be more than happy to follow up.
Landau asked about whether the costs between Seal Beach and other cities were comparable.
Nicholas said if you buy a cola in Seal Beach, it will cost the same as in Los Angeles or San Diego, generally. “The thing about these contracts is they are all tailor-made to meet our specific needs,” Nicholas said.
He said he couldn’t say what was comparable to other cities because each city is different.
However, based on his experience with parking and based on speaking with others who work in parking, the services provided were in line.
Landau asked if these contracts affected Dixon’s contract.
According to Police Chief Michael Henderson, at a future council meeting staff would bring a report on the subject.
Council Member Moore asked if there was a way for the pay stations to notify the city when it is not working.
Nicholas said there is a report that the police can access for information about down time or voided transactions.
“That seems like a high priority to get those working,” Moore said.
Nicholas said he was aware of the anecdotal reports about the pay stations not working, he gets messages all the time about that for his Briefing Room column for the Sun, but he believes those malfunctions are “exceedingly rare” based on the information that the police have.
A summary of four parking-related contracts
The following is background information on the four parking-related contracts that the City Council approved on Monday, Sept. 25.
PCS Mobile
“PCS Mobile provides automated license plate reader systems including cameras and data processing for automated parking enforcement,” according to the staff report prepared by Capt. Nick Nicholas of SBPD Support Services.
According to Nicholas, SBPD has been working with the license plate reader technology since 2018.
“This technology enables our parking enforcement personnel to remain ‘hands-off’ while citing violating vehicles by automatically photographing and ‘marking’ via time stamp,” Nicholas wrote.
According to Capt. Nicholas, the amendment to this contract would extend the agreement to Feb. 12, 2024. The amendment would also authorize the city manager to approve three more one-year extensions on the same terms with 30 days’ notice.
“This is a Police Department budgeted item,” Nicholas wrote.
“For the extended original term to and including February 12, 2024, by this Amendment No. 2, Consultant’s total compensation would be increased by $8,400.00 for a revised total not-to-exceed amount of $218,323.50,” Nicholas wrote.
According to the report, each additional one-year extension would be for $8,400 each year.
Parkeon, Inc.
“Parkeon, Inc. provides parking pay stations to support the paid parking program in the beach parking lots, originally installed in 2018,” according to Capt. Nicholas’ report for this item.
“Earlier this year, the pay station technology was updated and expanded to the Main Street lots, replacing the single-space parking meters,” Nicholas wrote.
“The pay stations are designed to provide an easy and convenient payment option for visitors and residents to initiate a parking session including the addition of pay-by-text services, providing additional payment options for customers,” Nicholas wrote.
Some individuals, in public comments at city meetings and on social media, have complained about the effectiveness of the pay stations. One individual recently complained about the parking pay stations in response to a recent Sun Newspapers Sidewalk Talk question. A recent Crime Log mentioned a complaint about a parking machine on Ocean Avenue. However, that machine was apparently working when police arrived. (See Crime Log, page 7)
“The pay stations are integrated with the City’s parking enforcement system, providing a seamless and real-time connection for compliance monitoring.
“Amendment No. 2 proposes to extend the term of the Agreement to and including February 12, 2024; and to authorize the City Manager the option to exercise up to three additional one-year extensions on the same terms and conditions on 30 days’ prior written notice to the Consultant,” Nicholas wrote.
The extension would be for a maximum of $99,115, according to Nicholas’ report.
Additional extensions would be a maximum of $10,920 for the extended term, according to Nicholas’ report.
Data Ticket, Inc.
This is the first amendment to the existing professional services agreement between Seal Beach and Data Ticket, Inc.
Data Ticket, Inc., provides parking citation and permit management services to Seal Beach, according to Capt. Nicholas’ report for this item.
“Both systems are fully integrated with the City’s parking technology providers including Automatic License Plate Reader (ALPR), pay stations and mobile payment which provides the unified capability to monitor and manage parking sessions,” Nicholas wrote.
“Comprehensive services include the citation issuance software and hardware utilized by both parking enforcement and animal control services and citation processing services which include noticing, adjudication processing, and the collection of fines,” Nicholas wrote.
“Data Ticket also supports the integrated parking permit management which provides the web-based customer service portal along with fulfillment and customer support services,” Nicholas wrote.
“The original term of the Agreement was for three years, with two optional one-year extensions, for a potential total of five years,” Nicholas wrote.
“Amendment No. 1 proposes to extend the term of the Agreement to and including December 9, 2023; and to authorize the City Manager the option to exercise one additional one-year extension on the same terms and conditions,” Nicholas wrote.
“This is a Police Department budgeted item. Additionally, this vendor has a set fee schedule which is collected on a transaction basis prior to releasing funds to the City,” Nicholas wrote.
Passport Labs, Inc.
This was the second amendment to the city’s current contract with Passport Labs, Inc., for parking enforcement equipment, technology, and services. The contract amendment would extend the agreement to Feb. 12, 2024, according to Capt. Nicholas’ report on this item.
The amendment would also authorize the city manager to extend the agreement for a one-year term from Feb. 12, 2024, to Feb. 12, 2025.
“Passport Labs, Inc., provides the mobile payment application in support of the City’s paid parking operation,” Nicholas wrote.
“Customers have the opportunity to manage their parking session utilizing their phones and can conveniently initiate and extend a parking session based on the designated parking zone and associated policies,” Nicholas wrote.
“Customers pay a convenience fee to Passport, Labs, Inc., for the use of this service in lieu of utilizing a pay station,” Nicholas wrote.
“This is an added payment option that was introduced in 2018 to provide another convenience to make it easier to manage an individual’s parking session,” Nicholas wrote.
According to Capt. Nicholas, Passport Labs, Inc., is integrated with Seal Beach’s parking enforcement system.
“The cost for Passport Lab, Inc. for parking enforcement, technologies and services to the City has been included in the Adopted Fiscal Year 2023-24 budget,” Nicholas wrote.
.
