Lehigh County will be providing free parking to county residents who attend semi-monthly meetings of the county commissioners.
At Tuesday night’s meeting, Rick Molchany, the county’s director of general services, announced that people going to meetings can park on a county-owned surface lot at Walnut and Church streets.
The lot is on the south side of Walnut, between 6th and 7th streets. It is directly across Walnut from the county’s employee parking garage.
Molchany said the lot will be open from about 5:15 p.m. until about 7:30 p.m. on meeting nights.
Commissioners’ committee meetings often begin at 5:30 p.m. and their main meetings begin at 7:30.
The county official said people who park in the lot will be able to exit at any time.
He said the lot will be available for the Dec. 10 commissioners meeting.
“I think that’s an accommodation that will support the needs of the citizens who come to these meetings,” said Molchany.
“If parking demands increase, we’ll evaluate our future plans and make suggestions as we need to.”
Parking has become an issue for people who attend commissioners meetings since the opening of the PPL Center multi-purpose arena as well as new restaurants around it in center city.
Once plentiful on-street parking has all but disappeared and a privately-owned parking lot across South 7th Street from the county government center has raised its parking fee from $1 to $3, higher on arena event nights.
A hockey game is scheduled in the arena on Dec. 17, the same night as the second December meeting of the county commissioners.
Molchany indicated the county also had hoped to make some money from the lot at Church and Walnut, which it had licensed to the Allentown Parking Authority. “We will be taking control of that lot again, to accommodate commissioner meeting parking,” he said.
Some commissioners feel strongly that residents who attend their meetings should not have to pay to park.
No more than about a half dozen residents regularly attend commissioners meetings, although many more show up when specific issues that concern them are on the agenda.
Commissioner Percy Dougherty thanked Molchany for coming up with a solution to the problem and asked how it will be policed to keep “arena people” from parking there.
Molchany said signs may be erected stating: “Lehigh County property for meeting parking only.”
“That may do the trick,” he said. “If not, we may have to take other steps, which include staffing during those couple of hours that the gate is up.”
Molchany also had advice for those who will be using the lot: “We’re asking that you police yourselves; kind of look left and right to make sure there are no arena parkers in that lot when you come to our meetings.”
Commissioner Michael Schware also commended Molchany for dealing the the parking issue, saying: “I know we all kind of beat up on him a little bit and took him to task for the situation. I definitely appreciate the effort and what looks like a good conclusion.”
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