He's "OUT," She's "Not Getting Answers" and We're Screwed! All Bad Signs!

If there is one positive thing about our good old fashioned parking meters (and there is more than one), it is this:  THEY DON'T REQUIRE SIGNS. Not one! Meters act as their own signs.  They are basically self-explanatory, and what little information anyone needs to know about a parking meter is written on it (or should be).  No signage is needed to direct someone to a parking meter -- they are always right there next to every metered parking space.  No questions, no ambiguity, and no signs (or poles) to purchase, install (in concrete), maintain (graffiti, cars hitting them, fading) or to replace.  Ever.  And, of course, like everything else, signs and sign poles ain't cheap.  Parking meters help keep costs DOWN!

The same cannot be said for $10,000 parking kiosks, which City Hall is trying it darndest to replace our trusty parking meters with.  You can't just remove a block's or parking lot's worth of parking meters and install a few kiosks in their place, plug them in and call it a day.  No, siree.  That might be the easy part.  The difficult part is directing drivers to the kiosks (since they are not found at every parking space) and explaining how the kiosks work. It's a new paradigm, one that people need help with.   In some cases, lots of help, especially in a town with lots of visitors from all over the world.  

Anyone who has travelled by car knows that, unlike parking meters, not all kiosks work the same: Do I get a ticket and return to my car to put it on the dashboard?  How do I pay; can I pay with cash?  Is there a parking space number?  Do I need to remember my license plate number?   Because of all this, parking kiosks require separate displayed instructions ON SIGNS, basically saying "Here is how our kiosks work and here is where you will find one."  The humble parking meter does not demand any of this.  I feel like every one of our parking meters is laughing at the hapless Parking Study Committee -- Jen Belton, Tom Depietro, Dominic Merante, Mohammed Rony, Dewan Sarowar (especially!) and, to a lesser degree, Kevin Wood, the parking consultant the city is paying to rid the city of its meters (at least he's making money helping the committee get nothing done!) -- just daring them to try to make their big beatiful plan happen and succeed at it.  "Go ahead, yank us out of the concrete we've been in for 40 years and replace us with your latest technology you are so wild about that will make you rich.  Don't forget to design those 4 or 5 different signs so that they are clear to everyone; pay for all those signs to be manufactured; find the proper locations for them; and, lastly, strategically install them so that every driver knows how they are to pay to park in downtown Hudson, a task we have been taking care of for decades for you for free and without complaint.  But don't say we didn't warn you:  you will regret messing with us.  And you'll wish you never listened to any of those consultants and kiosk companies telling you that we meters are obsolete, out of style money losers no city can survive with.  We've heard it all, and it makes us laugh like you have no idea.  And for that all 500 of us thank you."

During the most recent Parking Study Committee, which lasted nearly two hours (twice as long as they normally do), Jen Belton did not cry, but boy did she sound like she was ready to.  She is frustrated and impatient, for sure, and she is doing the bulk of the work.  ("I've got 200 pieces of paper in front of me," she whined at one point.)  The shit hasn't hit the fan yet, but it soon will.  We are well into the spring of 2025, when Phase 1 and 2 of the kiosk rollout were scheduled to be completed, and the issue of signage was discussed for at least 15 minutes toward the end of the meeting.  (This came after Jen explained the restructuring of the three phases.)  They haven't even finalized the wording on the signs and they don't know who will manufacture or install them.  It's astounding (and frightening):  $140,000 worth of new parking kiosks were delivered to the DPW garage on February 4th, and 4 months later the committee is still discussing the signs needed for the kiosks.  "Thousands and thousands of dollars" of signs, as Jen Belton declared during the meeting, as if she were sounding a warning or a plea for help.  

The design and wording of the signs is still 
not yet finalized.  We have kiosks, but the committee has not
agreed on the signs yet.  They aren't close to being created, 
let alone put in the ground.

Folks, we have a huge problem -- it's called the Ad Hoc Parking Study Committee.  The ridiculously (but aptly) named committee is wasting our money and they are wasting their time with this effort.  They have no idea what they are doing, and this project is destined to fail.  It will not -- IT CANNOT -- bring more revenue into the city if they continue down the path they have chosen.  Contrary to the stated reason for the kiosks, the city will lose revenue, possibly tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue.  But the problematic, amateur, dysfunctional committee is aided by one particularly huge bug in the system (there are at least a few of them):  a guy named Robert Perry, our DPW Superintendent who has a salary of, at least the last time I checked (it keeps rising every year!), $123,000.   But no one (especially HUDseen readers) should be one bit surprised by this.  I have no doubt that Jen Belton (and possibly the paid consultant) recently began having nightmares featuring Perry, even if he has been conspicuous in his absence. If Perry has attended one Parking Study meeting in the past 8 months, even via Zoom, I am not aware of it.  

This kiosk project is an enormous undertaking and, as you can imagine, it is going to require more than a little involvement and cooperation from Rob Perry as well as physical assistance from his Department of Public Works to get the project done and done properly.  All hands on deck, if you will.  The kiosks (which need electric power to go with the solar panels they come with) and signs will need to be installed in sidewalks and parking lots.  If there is no consistent and dedicated help from DPW, there will be no kiosks, signs or successful new parking program -- it is as simple as that.  And that is apparently the situation we and the Parking Study Committee are facing.  If the recent meeting made anything clear, it is that Rob Perry is MIA (surprise surprise!), he's likely uninterested in helping get this project going or succeeding, and Jen Belton is desperate for help.  You can hear it in her voice and see it on her face.  At this point, I'm thinking she regrets having taken on this responsibility-- she probably never imagined it would be so difficult, and she never knew that Rob Perry could be so unresponsive, mean and unhelpful.  I think that Belton might also be sick and tired of listening to Dominic Merante's constant concerns about how the kiosks will treat disabled people, as well as having to look at him reclining in his chair with his hands clasped behind his head as if he is sunbathing at the beach, the pose he is often in.

"I got this!"  He might as well have his fingers in his ears.

Gettin' it done! That's our consultant, Kevin Wood, at 
the bottom right. 

In case you missed it, here is a transcript of a bit of the meeting, starting at 1:45.  Keep in mind that there have been $140,000 worth of boxed parking kiosks gathering dust in a DPW shed for the past 4 months, which appears to be the only involvement with the kiosks that DPW Superintendent Rob Perry is interested in. 

Parking Consultant Kevin Wood (KW) begins things (via Zoom):  When I was up there.... don't laugh when I ask you this, but DPW was planning on adhering the signs to plywood and putting them in the ground.  Is this not the case?

Committee Chair Jen Belton (JB):  Well, as you have seen from my emails, I don't... I don't really know what is going on with the DPW.

KW: Okay 

JB: Unfortunately.

KW:  I'm confident that we can get signs done for the least amount of money.  I'm confident that we could make them look good.  But I'm confident that you can get installation for zero dollars from your own DPW or a local sign installer, less than it would take for me to send a crew there to install them.  Just being up front and honest.  

Jen then asks the paid consultant for a price quote regarding the manufacture and installation of the signs (how many signs there are to be installed, I do not know).  To do this, our consultant would have to hire a company (or companies) for us from, I believe, Long Island. 

JB (sounding as if the thought had just occurred to her): "Kevin, can you put everything in a quote for us?  Metal, plastic and, for the large signs, what it would cost to have beautifully done wooden carved signs. I just want to know what it costs.  All three of those. Plus, installation from your guys in case we can't get it done through the DPW for some reason... 'Cus today he [Perry] told me he was OUT.  (Her emphasis on the last word, sounding angry.)

KW: I did see that.

JB: I don't know, you know.  I don't know what that means, and I'm not getting answers. So. So, I'd like to know from you what the whole package would cost; highest end, lowest end.  And then we can talk about it at the next meeting.

KW: You got it.

I'm pretty sure I know what goes through Rob Perry's mind when he receives an email from Jen Belton about the kiosks (I wonder if she even has his cellphone number!).  It's one of three things, or possibly all of them simultaneously:  "I don't care"; "She can go to hell"; and "I didn't sign up for this and I have no time for her, her committee full of amateurs, her kiosks or her signs.  I ain't doin' it."  Oh, and there's this:  "I'll just tell her 'I'm out,' even though I'm not, and let her stew over that.  What's she gonna do, get me fired?"  It should be remembered that two months ago Jen Belton said she was going to reach out to Perry about getting the municipal parking lot next to MOTO repaved, describing the lot as "a disaster."  She has not mentioned anything about that lot since, and the lot is, yes, still an absolute mess that has needed an overhaul for years.

$100,000 in kiosks were delivered 4 months ago
to the DPW garage and the Parking Committee chairperson
"doesn't really know what's going on with DPW."  At least 
the committee has Dewan Sarowar to sort things out and make 
this expensive and time-consuming project happen soon.

There were so many troubling (and laughable) things said at this meeting that I can't possibly get to them all.  Here are just two. 

Early in the meeting, Jen Belton announced that when the kiosks are in the ground, parking enforcers will "have to scan every single license plate as they walk."  Not with their eyes, mind you, but with a handheld device which will tell enforcers if the car is in need of a ticket or not. I'm not making this up.  ENFORCERS WILL BE EXPECTED TO  STOP AT EVERY FUCKING PARKED VEHICLE THEY COME ACROSS, STEP OFF OF THE CURB INTO THE STREET, SCAN EVERY PLATE AND WAIT FOR A RESPONSE FROM THEIR FANCY GADGET TO TELL THEM WHETHER OR NOT TO ISSUE A TEN DOLLAR PARKING TICKET TO THE VEHICLE.  Gone will be the days of a flashing red light and flashing zeroes on parking meters to quickly assist the enforcers in their ticket issuing task while standing and walking on the sidewalk! This is absolutely insane, and it will send parking enforcers packing, with no one interested in taking their place.

Jen Belton also mentioned that the city is going to "need" to purchase a special License Plate Reader (LPR) to assist in parking enforcement.  The LPR would be mounted on a vehicle (which she said that Chief Franklin claims is available) solely for the use of parking enforcement. "As it drives, it scans the plates," Jen explained to Dominic Merante, "and they would know: okay, stop at this car because they need a ticket."  It won't just be a cop car with a surveillance gadget on its roof "stopping."  It will be a cop car driven by a parking enforcer double-parking (and idling) for 3 minutes on Warren Street, a narrow one-way side street or a parking lot to issue a ten-dollar parking ticket.  And doing it again 20, 50 or 100 feet further down the street.  Sounds like a great plan, doesn't it? Sign me up for that job!

Belton mentioned that this LPR would cost "around $53,000," adding, "We don't have that in our budget."

"The tyranny of the quarter," you say?  How about the "tyranny of too much fucking technology"!

Then there is this I will leave you with, which has nothing to do with the meeting but tells you pretty much everything you need to know about how badly this kiosk project is being mismanaged.  No one from the stupidly named Parking Study Committee has EVER reached out for input or suggestions from the most veteran parking enforcer we have (I know this for a fact).  This is perhaps the most frightening aspect of this committee: they'll "study" and act on a 3-year-old parking study we paid $24,000 for but they won't talk to any of the enforcers who walk the street every day reading meters, fixing meters, issuing parking tickets and speaking with people who park their vehicles downtown, including the one person who has been doing all of those things for 15 years or more and who has more institutional knowledge of parking matters than Jen Belton could dream of having.  He is an important resource, and they ignore him like he doesn't exist or has nothing worthwhile to offer.  The same goes for all the other parking enforcers. This, to anyone who knows anything about business or municipal management, is a recipe for disaster and failure.  YOU AREN'T TALKING THE PEOPLE WHO HAVE HAD THEIR SKIN IN THE GAME AND BOOTS ON THE GROUND FOR YEARS!

If the kiosks don't appear this year (anyone want to wager a bet with me that they don't?) and Jen Belton is not reelected to the council, who at City Hall is going to be the one to pull the plug on the Parking Study Committee to stop the financial losses before they sink our ship?  Will it be Tom Depietro, the Common Council "president" and Parking Study Committee member who was not present at the most recent meeting?