North Myrtle Beach gives initial approval to paid parking ordinance

North Myrtle Beach City Council voted unanimously Monday night to approve first reading of an ordinance that would expand the city manager’s ability to designate paid parking.

The ordinance would allow the city to make two oceanfront lots next to the Avista resort into paid parking to discourage guests and employees of that resort, who have designated parking elsewhere, from parking there. City officials said people from Avista are taking oceanfront spots from beachgoers that bring children or who haul gear to the beach. The lots would cost $1 an hour, with no daily limit.

The city is also considering changing an additional lot at 3rd Avenue South to paid parking, but City Spokesman Pat Dowling said that change would not be implemented immediately because the spots in that lot are being changed.

“A dollar an hour is not unreasonable. When we go down to Florida, it’s $20 a day,” Mayor Marilyn Hatley said. “It’s not too much to ask.”

Council members said they had received messages Monday from people concerned that the city was establishing paid parking throughout North Myrtle Beach, and Hatley said the paid parking would not affect the rest of the city.

“This is not an ordinance that says we’re going out and we’re changing all of the street ends to paid parking. This ordinance is being established only when those parking spaces are being abused,” she said.

Councilman Bob Cavanaugh said the city should be patient as visitors learn the new parking system.

“Give people time to maybe practice it,” Cavanaugh said. “Otherwise we’re gonna get flooded”

Hatley then suggested possibly creating a decal to allow city residents to park in the lots.

“Not for four lots guys,” City Manager Mike Mahaney responded. “We’ve got to walk before we can run”

A few years ago, North Myrtle Beach turned a lot adjacent to the Wyndham, on 4th Avenue South, into paid parking because of similar issues with employees taking up spaces. However, the city used an ordinance specific to the 4th Avenue South lot to make that parking change.

Mahaney said the ordinance would allow the city to make changes quickly should a similar situation arise in another area. Mahaney would be able to convert a public lot into paid parking without presenting a new ordinance to city council, a process which usually takes weeks as council must approve an ordinance twice before it takes effect. He told The Sun News that he would call council members and alert them before making such a change.

Another ordinance that council approved for a first reading Monday night is one that would establish the two new lots in a pay-by-app scheme. North Myrtle Beach proposed using using Passport Parking, which would allow users to pay by smartphone app, by calling a number on a regular cellphone or by logging onto a website. Myrtle Beach already uses a similar app called Parkmobile. City officials said the new system could reduce infrastructure costs.

City spokesman Pat Dowling said the city is experimenting with a parking app because parking customers frequently forget to display their ticket in their cars, making it hard for enforcement personnel to tell if a visitor had not paid or simply took their ticket with them.

North Myrtle Beach is facing a significant parking squeeze as growth in Little River and other nearby parts of Horry County sends more people to the beach there. City officials have voiced support in the past for a capital option sales tax, a 1 percent sales tax that would go completely toward infrastructure improvements and capital projects. Municipalities are currently unable to implement such a tax, and Hatley said the city hopes to first gain that ability through state legislation and then present the tax to residents as a referendum.

If such a tax fails or does not pass at the state level, however, funding for more parking could be hard to come by. Hatley said the city would not resort to charging in more lots, in that case.

“I think it would be other ways. We’d have to look for other ways to pay for it,” Hatley said.

This story was originally published December 5, 2016 at 8:07 PM with the headline "North Myrtle Beach gives initial approval to paid parking ordinance."