Beach parking at Alligator Point, and
to a lesser degree St. George Island, remains a big issue for
Franklin County and the county commission is now looking at long-term
solutions for the problem.
Sheriff AJ Smith raised the issue at
Tuesday's County Commission meeting, asking if the county could hire
parking attendants for the two locations so that deputies would not
have to spend so much time dealing with parking issues.
The county has already allowed local
towing companies to roam and remove vehicles parked illegally without
getting deputies involved – but it's not enough.
The sheriff said we are seeing record
crowds, and every weekend recently feel like Memorial Day.
He said it is a waste of deputies time
to write tickets because there are other crimes going on at the
beaches that they should be dealing with like littering, indecent
exposure, drunk driving and trespassing.
He estimated it would cost around 10
thousand dollar to have two people working through the summer, mainly
on weekends during daylight hours.
The county, however, doesn't have the
money for it but said they would approach some of the civic groups to
see if they could help pay for the service.
The commission also considered using
TDC funds for the program, but that's not an allowed used for Tourist
Development dollars.
Commissioner Noah Lockley expressed
frustration at that and pointed out that the TDC is in charge of
bringing tourists to the county but when visitors get here they have
no place to park.
The board also rejected using money
from their reserve for contingency fund, because of fears that that
money will be critical during hurricane season.
The sheriff said he will have to make
parking violations a low priority for the time being.
Meanwhile county staff will begin
looking at the issue and compiling information for a workshop where
they hope to come up with a long term solution to the beach parking
problem.
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