Billings council approves parks fee increase, adds 10% senior pool discount and 140% nonresident rate amid privacy concerns

The Billings City Council voted unanimously Jan. 27 to adopt a one-year parks, recreation and public-lands fee schedule that the parks division said will narrow operating deficits and reflect rising costs.

Gavin, a parks department staff member who presented the proposal, told the council the adjustments would likely bring about $105,975 in additional revenue and help offset wage and maintenance cost increases since 2020. "Since 2020, for instance, lifeguard wages have gone up 35% — that's about $82,000," Gavin said, also citing increases in pool-chemical and wading-pool wages.

The resolution passed after two council amendments. Councilmember Nese's amendment to add a 10% senior discount for pool rates (65 and older), rounded down to the nearest dollar, passed on a voice/hand count. Councilmember Nese also successfully moved to set nonresident fees at 140% of the resident rate — rounded up to the next whole dollar — replacing staff's proposed flat $20 surcharge for out-of-city ZIP codes.

Councilmembers debated both policy and timing. "I think we should have the director do this stuff and not bring every day-rate to the council," Councilmember Aspen Leiter said, reflecting several members' view that staff should handle routine rate-setting. Others asked for more data before changes take effect. Councilmember Shaw said he supported the concept of a senior discount but planned to vote against the amendment that night because the data on how many residents would qualify and the fiscal impact were not yet available.

Gavin told the council staff had five months of data analysis and had compared local fees with peer cities. He also described how the department used Placer AI geofencing software to estimate park usage: "We ran this one literally two hours before coming here today," he said, explaining the software estimates visits to geo-fenced park areas and reports aggregated counts and averages.

Residents raised privacy and surveillance concerns during the public hearing. Paul Clark said he was "aghast" at the idea the city could 'ping' phones and suggested the practice risked personal privacy. Jeff Kettleson told the council he found the ability to pull historical visitation data "very concerning." Gavin responded directly to those concerns during the hearing: "We are not collecting any phone numbers...we don't have a database of anything," he said. "The information is scrubbed. I do not know who's holding the cell phone. I do not know where you're coming from."

Council discussion also covered scholarships and equity. Gavin said Partners for Parks (the parks foundation) had agreed to offer scholarships to offset costs for nonprofits or residents with hardship, and staff reported 219 scholarships given the previous year.

Gavin and other staff told council that technical issues remain: nonresident determinations are based on ZIP-code entry in online registration (ZIP codes that overlap city boundaries default to city status) and staff may need more refined geofencing or address-level mapping in the future. Several councilmembers asked staff to collect senior-participation data to evaluate the long-term fiscal impact of the discount.

The resolution is a one-year measure; staff said rates and policy will be revisited next year after additional data collection. The council's motion to approve the resolution with the two amendments carried unanimously.

What happens next: The parks division will implement the adjusted rates for the activity guide scheduled to print soon and collect additional data on ZIP-code residency flags and senior participation for future council review.