Ted Zeller– Chairperson Daryl Hendricks- Vice Chairperson Candida Affa– Secretary Brent Hartzell-Treasurer Reverend Dr. Larry Pickens

Tamara Dolan - Executive Director John Ashley - APA Solicitor

ALLENTOWN PARKING AUTHORITY BOARD OF DIRECTORS MINUTES

A regular meeting of the Allentown Parking Authority Board was held at 12:00 p.m. on February 22nd, 2017 at the offices of the Allentown Parking Authority 603 W Linden Street, Allentown PA 18101

The following were in attendance:

Ted Zeller-Chairperson Daryl Hendricks-Vice Chairperson Candida Affa-Secretary Brent Hartzell-Treasurer Tamara Dolan – Executive Director John Ashley-APA Solicitor

Also in attendance:

Tony Ganguzza-Boyle Construction Marge Hopkins-Minutes

Ted Zeller called the meeting to order at 12:25 p.m.

MINUTES

Mr. Zeller asked for any corrections or additions to the January Board Meeting Minutes. Members of the Board did not have any corrections or additions; therefore, Mr. Zeller asked for approval of the Minutes. Page 1 Brent Hartzell made a motion to approve the Minutes, Daryl Hendricks seconded the motion and all of the Board members were in favor.

NOTATION

Prior to discussing old business, Mr. Hendricks stated that he had spoken to APA Court Officer Christina Dayton regarding issues that may be affecting the judgments of the court cases at Judge Ronald Manescu’s office. According to Mr. Hendricks, Ms. Dayton did not report any issues that needed to be addressed. Mr. Zeller asked whether the authority had given Ms. Dayton prosecutorial discretion to be able to withdraw citations if the circumstances warranted. Tamara Dolan replied that Ms. Dayton had been given the authority to do so.

OLD BUSINESS

Morning Call Parking Garage

Ms. Dolan stated that as development continues in the downtown corridor, the number of parking opportunities declines and the APA could be out of parking spaces in their own facilities in the next three to five years. In an attempt to find alternative parking, the APA had reached out to the Morning Call to inquire about using the MC staff garage for public use. Ms. Dolan reported that the MC welcomed the idea and also agreed to an inspection of their facility. Ms. Dolan stated that the APA had their engineers tour the facility and Ms. Dolan then turned the floor over to Tony Ganguzza, Vice President of Boyle Construction to report his findings. During his presentation, Mr. Ganguzza stated that he toured the +/-200 space deck with engineers from Tim Haas and Associates who had prepared a tiered maintenance report for the facility. The MC deck, stated Mr. Ganguzza, was structurally sound but in need of some safety repairs to bring it up to code and to the level of the APA facilities. The mandatory repairs include concrete spalling to repair areas of broken, pitted, or flaking concrete, epoxy injections as needed, in-slab column repairs, handrails, and constructing handicap accessible spaces. Miscellaneous repairs that are deemed not necessary but desirable include the installation of an elevator, additional pedestrian entrances and exits, and curb installation on the top of the deck. The price for the mandatory and miscellaneous repairs combined would be approximately $340,000. Repairs required to extend the life of the deck include sealing of the concrete, cleaning and coating, striping the entire structure, the installation of signage, stand pipes, fire extinguishers, floor drains, wiring, and illuminated signage. The estimated cost for the repairs to extend the life of the deck was reported at $1.1 million. One important note, continued Mr. Ganguzza, is that the MC deck was built in such a way that the engineers would not be able to adjust the slope to make the spaces for handicapped parkers accessible, and meet code requirements. Mr. Zeller asked the occupancy rate of the HP spaces in the Allentown Transportation Center parking deck. Ms. Dolan replied that there were a few monthly contracts who utilized the spaces and the remaining spaces were used only sporadically. Mr. Ganguzza suggested posting the MC deck to indicate that there were not any HP spaces and diverting all HP parkers to the ATC parking deck. Ms. Dolan responded that the conversation regarding the HP spaces would be held Page 2 after the APA reaches out to associates at the Lehigh Valley Center for Independent Living to determine whether that solution was feasible. According to Ms. Dolan, the MC currently holds a seven year lease on the property through the owner City Center Development and it would be appropriate to include CC in future discussions regarding the APA’s interest in the deck. Mr. Zeller questioned whether it would be wise to spend $1700 per space for seven years of use and stated that the $6000 per space repairs would be out of the question. Brent Hartzell agreed and replied that the only repairs that could be made, should the APA go forward, would be out of necessity and at the lesser amount. Mr. Hartzell then asked if there were other intentions for the MC facility and Ms. Dolan replied that at some point there would more than likely be other tenants that would require those parking spaces. Mr. Zeller stated that the same accessibility issues presented by the Boyle/Haas report would need to be addressed by CC at that time. Mr. Ganguzza agreed and stated that beyond the handicap accessibility issue, the height of the stair tower in the thirty-five year old deck slopes too low, requiring pedestrians to duck their heads in order to prevent contact with the concrete. The tower would have to be demolished to correct that issue. Mr. Hartzell asked Ms. Dolan what she thought the long-term growth trends would be for the downtown corridor. Ms. Dolan responded that the figures for growth were based on new tenants at City Center Three who would require two hundred additional parking spaces, while Tower Six would occupy four hundred parking spaces in the Community Deck. There is also, continued Ms. Dolan, the anticipation of one hundred additional parkers at City Center One, and twenty-five new parkers per quarter for the next eight quarters at the APA’s 9W deck. The Talen parking count noted Ms. Dolan, continues to decline and should settle at approximately 250 spaces. The loss of one hundred spaces at the Spiral deck calculates to approximately $100,000 in lost revenue per year. Ms. Dolan stated that though Talen may stay in the Neighborhood Opportunity Zone, the footprint will be condensed to just several floors in the building on Hamilton Street.

724 Turner Street

Mr. Zeller stated the demolition of the property acquired by the APA as part of a land transfer with City Center has been delayed because half of the house at 724 Turner Street is in the historic district. According to Mr. Zeller, City Center has agreed to keep the title to the property on their tax roles until they can undertake the demolition. Mr. Zeller asked Mr. Hendricks and Candida Affa if they would investigate whether the zoning lines could be redrawn on the property to exclude half of the home from being deemed historic, and both parties agreed to do so. Until it can be determined whether the lines can be re-drawn, the deadline to demolish the property will be extended.

Two-Garage Free Parking Special Update

Ms. Dolan reported that since the launch free parking initiative at the Spiral and Community Deck, twenty- one parkers have taken advantage of the program at the Spiral Deck and nine hundred have parked for free at the Community Deck. The program allows people to park in the Community or Spiral deck after 5pm Monday-Thursday and all day Sunday at no charge on days without an event at the PPL Center. According to Ms. Dolan the numbers continue to increase. Mr. Zeller pointed out that the restaurants along Hamilton Street are hitting their stride and that may be generating more interest in the Page 3 program.

NEW BUSINESS

Zagster

Zagster Bike Share is making headway and according to Ms. Dolan there are some “really great partnerships in place” for the program. If the momentum continues the program could launch as early as late May or June of this year. Ms. Dolan stated that the potential partnerships include City Center Corp., Lehigh Valley Hospital, and Muhlenberg and Cedar Crest Colleges. Zagster, continued Ms. Dolan, will map the locations for the share using Allentown’s demographics. Representatives from the City of Allentown are reviewing the locations to assist in determining appropriate locations. Zagster locations will not include parking garages; however, the APA has installed standard bike racks at their locations. Ms. Dolan stated that she had reached out to LANTA to see if they would be interested in a partnership with the APA for the share program. “It would make sense if the APA and LANTA would partner at the ATC and sponsor a station and truly make it a multi-modal location.” If the partnership would come to fruition, the APA and LANTA would each invest $4,500 for the program per year for two years. Mr. Zeller stated that he would like to get the bike share publicized and also inform the public that the APA has free bike parking in their decks and potentially adjacent to each Zagster location.. Ms. Dolan agreed with Mr. Zeller. Ms. Dolan continued with an explanation of how the program works and stated that the bike share works through a computer application where the individual will pay for the bike and go a kiosk to unlock their bike for use. The bikes can be returned to any Zagster location in the city. Each bike rack, continued Ms. Dolan, will have space for five Zagster bikes and there will be branding on both the bike and the bike station. The cost for each bike rack is $5,000 per year. Mr. Hartzell suggested that cameras be installed at all the Zagster locations. Ms. Dolan responded that there are cameras throughout the city but ultimately Zagster would be responsible for monitoring their bicycles as well as any damage or theft to the bicycles and the stations, and all maintenance.

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR’S REPORT

Alliance Hall

Ms. Dolan stated that Mayor Edward Pawlowski has developed a consortium of cultural groups that will be holding meetings at the Alliance Hall building during the evening and possibly on weekends. To accommodate the groups, the APA will not be enforcing the Alliance Hall parking lot during those times but will continue to monitor the lot. If customers begin to experience difficulty accessing their spaces, we would need to re-start enforcement.

Database Conversion

The APA database conversion is in its third week and is going “as anticipated”, according to Ms. Dolan and the contract parking bills are scheduled to be generated through the NuPark system at the end of the Page 4 month.

Delaying Deployment of Programs

After a review of APA finances, Ms. Dolan reported that the Social Media Marketing Program will be delayed for an undetermined period of time. Ms. Dolan noted that the APA was unable to make the full payment of $750,000 to the city at the end of 2016. In order to ensure that the APA processes and quality control are accurate, they have asked their auditors to come in and review their finances. Initial reports from the auditors have shown that the APA processes are appropriate; however, Ms. Dolan stated that “the APA may not be as good at forecasting their financial position in this new environment as they used to be a number of years ago.” The auditors, continued Ms. Dolan, have suggested that instead of reporting finances on a cash basis, the APA using an accrual method on a monthly basis. Mr. Hartzell will review the suggested change in processes and report his findings to the Board during the March meeting.

FINANCE REPORT

Ms. Dolan reported that though the revenue appears to be declining in the parking decks as represented in the financial statements for January, the figures are reflective of the way the payments were billed, received and recorded. After further review of the statements, Mr. Zeller noted that the Phantoms play- off games may result in an additional ten to fifteen event dates at the arena which would reflect well in the APA budget. Ms. Dolan agreed with Mr. Zeller and then stated it was important to note that the contribution to the city is nearly ten percent of the APA’s total budget. “The fact that we did not make that does not mean that the APA is in bad position but rather means that the APA was not in a position to make ten percent of budget as surplus”. Mr. Hartzell stated that he understood that fact and Mr. Zeller concurred and stated that “it is ok to be not as profitable as you think you will be and still be successful.”

COURTESY OF THE FLOOR

None.

THE MEETING WAS ADJOURNED AT 1:27 p.m.

THE NEXT BOARD MEETING WILL BE HELD ON MARCH 22nd.

Page 5