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4 Redwood City Downtown Business Group P. O. Box 1266 • Redwood City CA 94064 July 29, 2002 To: Mayor Richard Claire Members of the City Council cc: Chief Carlos Bolanos, Captain Scott Warner From: Johannes Hoech, Redwood City Downtown Business Group Re: Parking Fines At its meeting on July 22, the City Council was presented with a budget recommendation to raise parking fines from $ 15 to $20, taking effect in this fiscal year. During discussion of that recommendation, the City Council directed staff to obtain input from Downtown merchants prior to taking action on the proposal at its meeting of July 29. The Redwood City Downtown Business Group was contacted by the Police Department on July 24 for input on this issue. Between July 24 and 26 we surveyed our membership via e-mail with these results: 32% • Response rate (i.e. percent of people that replied of those contacted) 46% - Yes (i.e. percent of people who replied) 31 % - Yes, but with conditions (see below) 23% • No Conditions that would make the middle group consider the rise in parking fees included a phased implementation; more inexpensive, multi -hour parking; and fair and vigilant enforcement. With a 32% response rate we believe the above conclusions are valid generalizations of the opinions of the downtown merchant population at large. Typically a 5% response rate is considered statistically significant. Furthermore, since it is quite likely that the 68% that did not respond to the survey don't care enough to respond, one could make the point that the opposed population may be as low as 7 %. Thus, we conclude that if a parking fine rise would be accompanied by the above- outlined conditions, our sample suggests that between 7% and 23% of the downtown merchant population would be opposed, or that 77% or higher would be in favor. Thank you for working with the Redwood City Downtown Business Group. We look forward to working with you for the revitalization of our Downtown. ATTACHMENT 3