Council kills its own fee increase talk
Facing an overflow crowd and an 85-page printout of often scorching emails, the City Council on Tuesday backed away from even discussing steep increases in parking permit fees for residents. Councilman Kit Bobko didn’t wait for the fee proposal to come up in the course of the council’s meeting agenda. Instead he pounced during the council’s opening announcements, moving to kill any discussion of an increase in the fees. It was Bobko – typically not a fee raiser – who had brought the matter before the council in the first place. In September 2010 Bobko, Mayor Peter Tucker and Councilman Michael DiVirgilio voted to discuss raising residents’ parking permits from $40 to $100 a year, with a third permit at the same home going up to $200 and a fourth permit to $300, along with an annual increase from $40 to $300 for guest parking permits. Councilmen Jeff Duclos and Howard Fishman had voted against discussing any fee increases. By Tuesday, Bobko was more than persuaded that the discussion should not occur. “I’d like to dispense with that right away, Mr. Mayor,” Bobko said. Turning to the large and sometimes boisterous audience – which squeezed into the council chambers, filled the…
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