Soon we will have metered parking downtown until midnight. More revenue for the city, less visitors to spend money. What a racket! As I have said many times, it is anti-development.

But we should count our blessing we don't live in Hoboken, New Jersey. If you park there more than four hours, you get your car booted and towed. Even if you move your car to the other side of town, you will get booted. Four hours per car per day. Their signs are purposefully unclear so most people fall into the trap. A fine example of another municipality misguided by the need for revenue overriding the importance of attracting visitors and residents. Amazing!

Fox 5 News did a report on Hoboken last night. The Mayor justified the parking policy. Something about 16,000 cars and only 10,000 spaces. Part of the justification could also be the 19.2 percent increase in parking fee revenues totaling $1.32 Million.

A blog tells the story pretty well. http://hoboken411.com/archives/66079

Is New Rochelle next to get the spotlight?

I don't care who the opponent is, it is time that the ten dollar word using, über elitist, wanna be dictator, but PART TIME MAYOR be taken down from his perch.

Enough is enough. I can laundry list his accomplishments, or lack there of, but his smug egomaniacal, inefficient brand of local political leadership has to end!

This is why term limits need to be a reality. Not only would they free up the specter of political machine partisan politics, they would foster the development of truely independent, not party controlled candidates on both sides of the aisle.

St Paul might have visible warts, that could call into question elements of his character. But I implore you not to take the allegations at face value. Does a star athlete need to be an upstanding father or husband to produce in his arena? And what about Gnome and his private life? Is it as germane as it appears? Or is his utopian existence merely a facade? I could care less!! What I do care about is advancing this city forward. And hope to do so with a changing of the guard.

During Monday night’s debate sponsored by the League of Women Voters, I stated that I was against the increase in parking fees from 50 cents to a dollar and extending metered parking until midnight in the downtown business district.

Today, I went around to ask more merchants what they felt about the pending changes. As I said during the debate, many merchants are scratching their heads trying to understand this bizarre decision. Some, whose business close at 6PM, are indifferent.
Restaurateurs, especially on Division Street, seemed to support the changes.

Residents are exceedingly angry about extending the metered parking until midnight.

This is a policy disaster for residents and visitors of the downtown area. To have to endure six more hours in which one can receive a ticket while parking downtown is oppressive.

Who was the brilliant person on the City Council or in city government who proposed to raise the meter rates 100% and make the meters on Main St. and city parking lots effective until 12 mid. ?

Talk about sticking it to the residents and visitors, this was truly a brutal display of a local government gone wild.

Restaurants, bars and any other businesses that stay open beyond 6 PM are going to suffer.

Don't the City Fathers (I use that term loosely) stay tuned to other places in the County that have done this (notably White Plains) and have received justified criticism from everyone?

Unfriendly and totally blind to residents and visitors alike. Is this what we want our city to be noted for? Shame, shame.

The parking pay stations at the library lot have finally been fixed and enforcement resumed on Monday.

When asked during the first week of September about the parking pay stations, New Rochelle spokesperson Kathy Gilwit said, "Parts are on the way and machines will be prepared as soon as possible".

"On the way"? How were they being shipped, a slow boat from China? Has FedEx and UPS gone out of business?

In a world of Just-in-Time Delivery and overnight and even same day express shipping, it is impossible to understand how, four months after the parking pay stations in the New Rochelle Public Library parking lot were vandalized and rendered inoperable, the City had still not repaired the machines.

The City is going broke but giving away tens of thousands of dollars in parking revenue? Something is seriously wrong here.

I am sitting down having lunch with my daughter when a squad car from the New Rochelle Police Department pulls up in the front of the café. I am thinking they are coming in to have some coffee. But they just sit there for 15 minutes.
Suddenly, the driver comes in the café and issues a ticket to the clerk for having chairs and table outside without a city permit.
Ouch!
The clerk gets the owner John Reverol on the phone to talk with the cop. Of course, I cannot hear the conversation but one thing was clear. My friend John asked for a warning, not a ticket. The officer responded: “Sorry, the chief does not allow us to give warnings.”

With little fanfare, the downtown CVS has opened for business this past weekend. I happened to ride past on my bike and the automatic doors opened. Those doors will welcome a tremendous number of downtown residents who have been clamoring for a place to get drug store items. Many would prefer a Target or similar retail business, but a CVS could be the beginning of more retail stores located downtown.

Initially, I wondered why CVS would open a third store within a one-mile radius. There is another CVS about three blocks away on Main Street which is open 24-hours and a third on North Avenue near Iona College. The new CVS will have hours from 7AM to 10PM. But after a conversation with Ralph DiBart, Executive Director of the New Rochelle Downtown Business Improvement District (NRDBID), I got the whole picture.