The City of Santa Barbara is increasing its traffic enforcement. Four new patrol cars with automated license plate readers will hit the road to electronically chalk vehicles later this year. The city already has four police vehicles patrolling the roads.
The City of Santa Barbara is increasing its traffic enforcement. Four new patrol cars with automated license plate readers will hit the road to electronically chalk vehicles later this year. The city already has four police vehicles patrolling the roads. Credit: Joshua Molina / Noozhawk photo

Four new traffic enforcement vehicles with license plate readers are coming to Santa Barbara by the end of the year as part of a series of changes to the city’s downtown parking program.

The city also plans to install a pay-on-foot parking system kiosk at its Helena Avenue lot as a pilot program.

The two actions are part of an overall effort to increase enforcement of downtown parking limits.

“We’re proposing these changes in an effort to increase compliance on the street and make sure we are getting that parking turnover,” said Sarah Clark, parking programs supervisor.

The Santa Barbara Police Department currently has four vehicles that read license plates and issue tickets to vehicles on the street that are parked longer than 15, 75 or 90 minutes depending on the zone. The city no longer “chalks” tires; instead, the vehicles read license plates.

If a vehicle exceeds its time on the street, a police officer will place a ticket on the windshield. By the end of the year, the city plans to double the number of vehicles with license plate readers to eight.

Police cars with the license plate readers also will patrol neighborhoods with residential parking permits.

“We are trying to work with downtown parking to clean up some of the time zones, but also the residential permit areas are going to be transferred to a licensed plate permit as opposed to a hang card,” Cmdr. Chris Payne said.

Drivers who park their vehicles downtown on city streets must move them off the block, rather than just re-parking them. Payne said the technology can tell if someone just moves their car but parks it on the same block. Drivers who move their vehicles will get ticketed if they re-park on the same block.

The city plans to install a pay-on-foot kiosk at its Helena Avenue parking lot in Santa Barbara's Funk Zone.
The city plans to install a pay-on-foot kiosk at its Helena Avenue parking lot in Santa Barbara’s Funk Zone. Credit: Joshua Molina / Noozhawk photo

In addition, the new patrol vehicles will have technology that will allow the vehicles to communicate with one another. If one patrol vehicle drives down a street and electronically chalks a car, that data will be shared with the other license plate reader vehicles.

“I am excited to hear about the new technology and the sharing of the data between vehicles,” said Trey Pinner, who sits on the Downtown Parking Committee. “That sounds like a big help. That seems like a huge advancement.”

Santa Barbara has been toying with ways to increase its parking revenue after a dramatic drop in the number of people parking in downtown city lots. The COVID-19 pandemic and the closure of State Street have both reduced the number of vehicles traveling and parking downtown.

A year ago, the city proposed installing kiosks and creating timed 15-minute parking on many streets downtown. Officials backpedaled after the public and City Council thumped the proposal.

Clark said the city will tiptoe into a kiosk program by installing a pay-on-foot kiosk at its Helena Avenue public lot in the Funk Zone. People will enter their license plate and how long they are staying. If they exceed their time, they will receive a notice-to-pay in the mail. Clark said the city is considering a phone app to pay but is not quite there yet.

The city’s Downtown Parking division is also moving from the Public Works Department to the city administrator’s office, where City Administrator Kelly McAdoo can have control.

— Noozhawk South County editor Joshua Molina can be reached at jmolina@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.