Downtown Parking Update 6/9: Pay-to-Park Temporarily Paused

Last week, we received notification that the parking pay stations in our City-owned lots were not in compliance with ADA regulations. We were deeply disappointed that we failed to meet accessibility requirements in the placement of our pay stations and we are incredibly sorry about this oversight.

Immediately after receiving the notification, we started a visual review of our pay stations and the environments they have been placed in to learn more in order to quickly address this issue. We also started conversations with our parking vendors about how we could fix this situation.

St. Joseph is a community for everyone, and it is important to us that everyone has access to our town, regardless of ability level. We understand how infrastructure can widen inequities and contribute to the exclusion of certain groups and communities.

We are currently working to bring in our local disability network to ensure the process includes the voices and input of people who have been impacted by this oversight.

We have decided to suspend our downtown parking program until we can resolve this situation. Until further notice, paid parking will not be enforced in any City-owned lot or on any streets in the City of St. Joseph.

We are committed to keeping our community informed about the downtown parking program and will release information, updates, and action items as we learn more and make decisions to move forward.

In this moment of pause, we have an important opportunity to ensure our process is as transparent and collaborative as possible. As we assess the accessibility of our pay stations, we are also taking the time to meet with downtown business owners to listen to them and learn more about how we can use our downtown parking program to address traffic challenges and congestion without negative impacts to their customer retention.