A controversial new “daylighting” law that makes it illegal to park within 20 feet of an intersection is generating so much cash for San Diego that it has become a factor in how the city plans to close a gaping budget deficit.
Critics say the city, which raised fines for the new violation from $77.50 to $117 two days after enforcement began March 1, is trying to balance its budget on the backs of unsuspecting drivers unaware of the new law.
The law applies even if a curb is not painted red and even if there aren’t “no parking” signs. City crews have painted some curbs and posted signs in some areas, but there is no indication of the new rule at many of San Diego’s 16,000 intersections.
The city had issued 6,133 daylighting citations through the end of May, prompting the city’s independent budget analyst to estimate the fines could help balance the budget during the new fiscal year by generating $850,000.
But a coalition of City Council went even further this week. Looking for new revenue sources so they could reverse some budget cuts proposed by Mayor Todd Gloria, the coalition revised the IBA estimate upward to $1.3 million.
The IBA and the coalition — Council Kent Lee, Henry Foster, Joe LaCava and Sean Elo-Rivera — also disagree about how reliable daylight revenue will be as a source of long-term city revenue.
The IBA suggested in a June 3 report that citations will dwindle as more people become aware of the law and avoid parking within 20 feet of intersections.
“As the public becomes more aware of daylighting regulations, we anticipate that fewer citations will be issued, resulting in declining revenue,” the IBA said.
The coalition expressed more optimism about future revenue in its June 10 budget compromise proposal, which the council adopted 7-2 after a long debate. It said daylighting fines are unlikely to drop based on the track records of similar fines.
“This is not the case for other fine types such as street sweeping or expired meters, which remain at a high volume of fees year-over-year,” the coalition said.
One key difference is that more curbs will steadily be painted red, which would seem to make citations less frequent in coming years.
A city spokesperson said Thursday that city crews have painted curbs red at about 400 intersections after evaluating about 1,000 of the city’s 16,000.
The spokesperson, Nicole Darling, said the plan is to get the remaining curbs painted gradually as part of paving efforts or infrastructure projects.
Red-curbing near intersections is being added to all capital improvement projects, slurry seal efforts, privately managed projects and regular day-to-day traffic operations assessments, Darling said.
But it could still take many years for the city to complete all the curb painting. City officials have stressed that the new daylighting law, AB 413, is a state mandate that includes no money to help cities comply.
The law doesn’t only apply to intersections. It also applies to curbs within 20 feet of any crosswalk, whether it is marked or unmarked.
That’s because the goal is making city streets safer for pedestrians by preventing cars from parking so close to intersections and crosswalks that they block the views of other cars ing through.
At a few hundred other intersections, the buffer zone for parking is 15 feet instead of 20 feet because there are curb bulb-outs that slow traffic by narrowing the intersection for safety.
Citations — and city revenue — could possibly rise if the city takes a more aggressive enforcement approach.
So far, the Police Department’s parking enforcement division has focused only on downtown and other areas with meters. They said this winter that they had no plans for proactive enforcement in the many residential parts of the city where parking officers don’t typically patrol.
While the Councilmember coalition said $1.3 million was a reasonable estimate for citation revenue from the daylighting law in the new fiscal year, the budget they approved Tuesday left the revenue estimate for those citations at the $850,000 level that had been proposed by the IBA.
