Kalispell City Council to consider changes to downtown parking regs, including more expensive tickets
A driver parallel-parks along South Main Street in downtown Kalispell in this Jan. 30, 2019, file photo. (Casey Kreider/Daily Inter Lake)
Kalispell City Council on Tuesday will consider overhauling downtown parking regulations to free up on-street spaces for business patrons and crack down on chronic offenders.
The proposals include more onerous parking tickets, license-plate recognition technology and a new rule to discourage motorists from moving between spots on a single city block to avoid a fine. Council is expected to discuss the proposals on May 26 without taking any action.
Council meets at 7 p.m. at City Hall, 201 First Ave. E.
The municipality’s Parking Advisory Board recommended the changes after reviewing a Downtown Forward Coalition report on ways to create more parking for customers.
The Kalispell Police Department allocated $70,000 for license plate recognition software in the proposed municipal budget for fiscal year 2027. The system will help two dedicated officers more efficiently enforce time limits on downtown parking. In the past, the city relied on a parking enforcement officer chalking tires to keep track of parked vehicles.
The system is not connected to the criminal justice network and only records the license plate number, type of vehicle and duration it’s been in the same spot, according to Police Chief Jordan Venezio.
Other Montana cities including Bozeman, Missoula and Whitefish use similar technology to enforce parking rules.
The board also recommended letting officers give out multiple tickets to a vehicle left in the same spot over the course of the day. Vehicles are currently only ticketed once per day, but the new technology would allow for up to three tickets a day.
The board recommended raising the standard parking fee from $10 to $20, increasing safety violation fines from $10 to $50, and boosting boot fees from $35 to $100.
Council will also consider an ordinance to curb so-called “musical cars,” a tactic Downtown Kalispell Forward described as when drivers move their vehicles a few spots every couple of hours to avoid a ticket.
A block ordinance would require cars to be moved to a different block to avoid an infraction.
The Downtown Forward Coalition, which proposed many of the recommendations forwarded to Council, hopes stricter enforcement will push downtown employees to stop parking on Main Street and instead head to the underused permit lots nearby.
Reporter Jack Underhill can be reached at 406-758-4407 or junderhill@dailyinterlake.com. If you value local journalism, pledge your support at dailyinterlake.com/support.