Council hones proposed RV parking restrictions

Proposal targeting on-street 'storage' of RVs would impose limits on RV parking.

LAKEWOOD – City Council next month will consider a series of restrictions in an effort to curb the use of city streets for recreational vehicle storage by limiting the time RVs can be parked in the right of way.

The issue, one of two on the discussion agenda for a study session earlier this week, would include 48-hour loading and unloading periods before and after camping trips and a process for “extended stay” permits allowing two-weeks of on-street parking a year to accommodate visitors as long as the RV is parked along the street frontage of the property they are visiting.

The proposed ordinance would apply to all recreational vehicles, no matter what length. The city currently bans RVs longer than 25 feet from Lakewood streets. There are no current restrictions on parking RVs under 25-feet long on city streets.

Councilwomen Cindy Baroway and Vicki Stack questioned the need to regulate the vehicles at all, considering the low number of complaints the city receives.

The city’s Code Enforcement Department logs between 30 and 45 complaints about parked RVs each year, representing less than 1 percent of complaint calls to the department. Only five such complaints have been logged since Jan. 1, according to a Code Enforcement official.

“What’s really the issue here, we haven’t really had many complaints,” said Baroway, the only City Council member who owns an RV. The real issue, she said is storing RVs on public streets, not parking them there.

“The root cause is storage,” she said.

Baroway urged Council to consider a two-week parking limit instead, which would allow time for unloading and servicing the vehicle after trips.

Police Chief Kevin Paletta said it would be more difficult to enforce the two-week limit.

“The shorter the timeframe, the more enforceable it is,” Paletta said.

But Paletta also said there is no perfect solution.

“Almost and draft proposal we might offer has some issues,” he said.

Council also added the two-week permit to the proposal and agreed there should be exceptions for “extra-ordinary circumstances” after Councilwoman Sue King said accommodation should be made for such things as folks who are forced into RVs while their homes are being repaired after fire or storm damage.

The proposed regulation of RV parking is one of the first issues brought to Council under an extended consideration period. This week’s discussion of the issue is the second time it has been addressed at a study session. Council usually discusses such issues only once before the proposal is brought to public hearing for a final vote.

The RV parking issue also is one of the first that Council has put before citizens during the compilation process, allowing the public to comment on the issue via the Internet through the city’s on-line feedback page.

“There’s going to be a lot of input on this one,” Mayor Bob Murphy said when Council opened the public discussion of the RV parking issue on the feedback page.

Council scheduled its public hearing on the issue for July 12.