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Group One approves streamlined parking-commission charter language, sends draft to full CRC
Summary
Group One voted to advance new, condensed charter language for the parking commission that removes dated 1960s operational directives and clarifies the panel’s advisory role on off-street parking facilities, fines and fees; commissioners debated retaining references to meters and land acquisition.
Group One of the New Canaan Charter Revision Commission voted March 18 to forward a streamlined draft of the charter language governing the town’s parking commission to the full commission.
The proposed text replaces detailed, operational sections of the current charter — many dating to the 1960s — with a higher-level paragraph that makes the parking commission an advisory body to the board of selectmen on planning, development, regulation, management and operation of off-street public parking facilities and related policy items such as parking fines, fees and meters.
Steve Pace introduced the draft and described it as an effort to bring the parking-commission language in line with other municipal commissions. Commissioners said the edits remove prescriptive day-to-day directives that belong in ordinances rather than in the charter. Several members urged retaining explicit mention of off-street parking facilities and land acquisition as examples of topics the commission may advise on; the redraft was adjusted to include “off-street public parking facilities” and a clause listing parking policy, fines, parking facilities, land acquisition, parking fees and operations.
Commissioners also discussed whether the first selectman should have a tie-breaking vote on commissions; members agreed that question should be handled across all commissions, not in isolation for the parking panel.
Vote and next steps: The group voted to move the revised parking-commission language up to the full Charter Revision Commission for consideration. Members suggested that any operational provisions (schedules, reporting dates, or enforcement details) be handled through town ordinance rather than carved into the charter text.
