News, Public Notice

Parking meter kiosk won’t be added to town hall lot

by Geoff Fox

Town officials addressed questions raised by residents of Hancock during their October town meeting on Tuesday, October 11.

The first question came during the citizen’ s comments portion of the meeting when Preston Hall asked if the town had a start date for the new meter kiosks that have been installed in various spots around town.

As of right now, there is no start date; however, town officials said they would put a notice in The Hancock News when they go live.

Hall also asked about business owners having to pay when they park for their businesses.

“Anybody that parks on the sidewalks where the meters are will pay for parking,” Councilman Roland Lanehart, Jr. told him.

Mayor Tim Smith said there would be a “wallet” in the parking app where businesses can validate parking for their customers.

Right now, there are five meters installed in town – one in the Rail Trail parking lot and four along Main Street. Two more are part of the deal.

The first of the two is to be installed in the municipal lot along Canal Street. A second was slated for the parking lot of Town Hall. However, that was met with blowback from town officials.

Smith said there have been issues with people parking in the lot at Town Hall for three or four days and then come and get luggage out of them.

He said state workers have to park there because of security issues; however there are vehicles the town has issued notices about parking in the Town Hall parking lot.

The state employees would have their tag registered in the system, Smith said, with the new meter.

Lanehart and other officials questioned Smith about residents who would come to the town offices to pay their utility bills, or Girl Scouts coming for meetings.

Officials said they could put a sign in the lot and not put the meter in that particular lot.

Smith said if there were an event at the Community Center, the kiosk would be shut off.

There was also the question if the town were to plow the lot during the winter and the need to move vehicles.

Councilman Josh McCusker made a motion for town officials to not put the kiosk in the Town Hall parking lot. The vote was unanimous to not install that meter and install a two-hour maximum sign instead.

Faith added the council would have to decide where the kiosk that was for Town Hall would have to be placed. Pango, the company who owns the parking kiosks, said they would like to have the unused kiosk back rather than letting it sit until the town makes the location decision.