By Margie Plunkett
Delray Beach’s valet parking system will escape a comprehensive overhaul, but will be tweaked to address issues raised by commissioners and staff.
“As far as I’m concerned, from what I understand with the stakeholders downtown, they’re happy with the way it works,” said Mayor Woodie McDuffie at a March workshop meeting.
Commissioners voted to modify some of the requirements of valet licensing at their April 3 meeting, including signage, valet shirt logo, year-round operation and 3-year contracts with annual inceases.
The valet system has been among several parking factors under consideration, along with metered downtown parking and other ideas contained in the working parking study.
Two charrettes were held this year to collect input on parking from merchants and restaurateurs.
City parking specialist Scott Aronson presented valet options to commissioners at the meeting, noting that the current system — operated by restaurants that contract with valet firms — includes 10 valet stations. The fees that are charged to motorists were recently capped by the commission at $10. Valet queue fees are $125 monthly for each parking space east of the Intracoastal and $100 on the west of the waterway.
Restaurateurs have said that the valet stands are loss-leaders that cost an estimated $25,000 to $40,000 to run annually, according to Aronson.
The parking study recommended re-evaluating queue locations, creating uniformity among valets, improving public access awareness and exploring other options, according to Aaronson.
Given the options of going out with request for proposals for valet services or the city operating valets, commissioners stayed with the current system.
The commission voted to make changes after the Parking Management Advisory Board, at its March 27 meeting, voted to recommend several of the “tweaks” to the system, including:
• Valet-queue signage must include the words open to the public
• The logo of the lessee — the restaurant company running the queue — must be on the valet shirt.
• The stand must operate year-round.
• Parking required under the licensing agreement will be under the name of the licensee.
• Valets will operate under three-year leases with a 3 percent annual increase in the queue fee they pay, beginning in the spring of 2013. Aronson’s recommendation differs and would bump the first annual increase up to 5 percent.
The board declined to recommend that each stand be required to be staffed by two people, opting to leave that to the operator’s judgment — contrary to staff’s recommendation for two.
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