RE: Agenda ITEM 7E – April 1, 2025
March 31, 2025
Dear Madame Mayor and Honorable Members of the City Council of Alameda I would appreciate it if you could clarify for us exactly when the Council discussed its perceived need for removing curbside parking spaces from the City’s dwindling pool of such spaces. We would like to know the exact instruc�ons given to Staff to engage in the process that resulted in the dra�ing of their proposed Ordinance that is being considered in Item 7E. We don’t believe that a vague instruc�on along the lines of Make Alameda Great Again by Reducing Greenhouse Gases (MAGA – Gas) would be sufficient to warrant the expenditure of �me spent on producing their highly problema�c proposed ordinance.
As far as we’ve been able to determine, a current, or even near-term, need for undertaking the proposed construc�on of curbside charging sta�ons has not been demonstrated. In addi�on, Staff’s apparent belief that it would be appropriate to commandeer such spaces required for their from the City’s limited pool of unrestricted curbside spaces currently available certainly has not been validated by anyone, let alone the residents of our city.
We see that the process proposed above becomes even more egregious when we acknowledge that the Council has already authorized the elimina�on of nearly two hundred curbside parking spaces across the City. It is our understanding that nearly one hundred curbside parking spaces were eliminated to make room for bike lanes on Clement Avenue. In addi�on, twenty to forty, or more, spaces will be eliminated in the process of comple�ng the Council-approved, or soon to be approved, modifica�ons of Grand Street and Fernside Boulevard. Fi�een to twenty more spaces will be cannibalized by the construc�on of already approved traffic circles. And who can count the number of spaces being eliminated through the much-needed process of improving visibility at selected uncontrolled or semi-controlled intersec�ons.
The need for elimina�ng many of these spaces could be obviated by simply conver�ng these intersec�ons to four-way stops. And let us not discount the parklet effect on Park Street and Webster Street, and the blocking-off of a por�on of Alameda Avenue.
One can quibble with the exact number of curbside spaces that have already been, or soon will be, lost as a consequence of ac�ons taken by our City Council on the ins�ga�on by Staff.
The proposed ordinance includes specific condi�ons that have not been evaluated, let alone approved, by the Council. Note that it appears that the determina�on of the number and loca�on of the restricted spaces is being delegated to the Director of Public Works and are not subject to input from the Council or residents of neighborhoods impacted by the parking restric�ons.
A few other considera�ons that can be derived from reading the Staff Report and proposed ordinance include that in order to avoid being cited for illegal use of the restricted spaces a vehicle must be an EV connected to the charging unit though it need not be ac�vely charging. This means that the EV drivers can hook up to the chargers and then go home for the night, the weekend, or even take a trip to Greenland while being secure in the knowledge that their vehicles will be safely protected in an exclusive parking space rou�nely being patrolled by the APD. The flip side, off course, is that there will be many hours of each day and probably most of each night during which many of the restricted spaces will remain empty. Waisted curbside parking spaces. Valuable resources squandered. An asset that can help maintain the quality of life in many of our neighborhoods – wasted.
This ac�vity by the way is intended to generate revenue for the City. The ini�al fine is to be set at $45 per incident. But we can be sure that even though it's not in the current version of the ordinance, it will eventually be amended to allow for increasing the fine no less o�en than annually. And there might be added an escala�ng fee for repeat offenders.
It appears, however, that the real money will go to the bidder who gets the contract for construc�ng and managing the charging sta�ons. And in return for undertaking this obliga�on the bidder(s) will receive, at no cost, the exclusive use of pieces of City property and will acquire the ability to purchase electricity which can then be resold at whatever they can get away with. Will they be subject to sales tax? One addi�onal point of concern is Staff’s claim that their proposed project is categorically exempt from having to sa�sfy CEQA regula�ons which claim, we suggest, should be subjected to specific valida�on by the City Atorney. Such valida�on of the legi�macy of the claim of exemp�on should not be delegated to members of the staff who are not licensed to prac�ce law. I believe that we, the residents of Alameda, deserve nothing less than the assurance that the laws and regula�ons intended to protect the environment and quality of life in our city are being properly enforced by the members of our City Council.
And finally, please note that the Staff report for tonight’s Consent Calendar ITEM 5D which is intended to create a master contract governing the construc�on and management of the proposed project iden�fies it as “a Pilot Program”. This suggests that their project should be looked at as an experiment and which implies that if the public is unhappy with the outcome, including any unintended nega�ve consequences, that the charging-related structures will be removed at a �me and cost to be determined. Please be aware that the designa�on as a pilot project is not men�oned in the 7E Staff report, nor in the proposed Ordinance, itself. (copied from Item 5D: “Recommendation to Authorize the City Manager to Negotiate and Execute Master License Agreements for the Public Electric Vehicle Charger Pilot Program. …”) This is a complex issue that deserves public discussion with refinement of the details, some of which we may have described subop�mally above. But I think you get our point.
Thank you for taking the �me to read these comments and for being willing to require a more diligent analysis before taking defini�ve ac�on.
Jay Garfinkle