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7 of 12 <br /> <br />Verra Mobility) to direct people to available spaces. This would involve steps such as creating an <br />updated parking inventory and conducting detailed engineering, parking, and planning analysis. <br />As a rough cost estimate, installing the digital directional parking signs at City’s parking lot within <br />the Downtown area (three locations) would be approximately $200,000 to $300,000, depending <br />on power availability. Staff recommends pursuing other, less expensive options, particularly <br />improved wayfinding and use of app-based technology and evaluating their effectiveness, before <br />investing in these more costly approaches. <br /> <br />C. Downtown Code Enforcement <br />As the City Council is aware, the City has a single employee (a Senior Code Enforcement <br />Officer) whose responsibilities extend citywide. As a result, Code Enforcement largely occurs on <br />a complaint basis, and, since the volume of inquiries and complaints exceeds staff capacity, the <br />Code Enforcement Officer is required to prioritize his enforcement efforts, starting with immediate <br />life-safety items, down to quality of life or nuisance issues. This August 2025 City Council <br />memorandum explains some of the current challenges and code enforcement approaches. <br /> <br />Staff routinely responds to Downtown code compliance complaints and is typically able to reach a <br />resolution on those items. However, the higher sensitivity around the Downtown and its many <br />small businesses, combined with the need to maintain a balance between aggressive <br />enforcement and supporting local businesses, enforcement can be challenging and often time- <br />consuming. <br /> <br />With respect to outdoor dining, in recent years, staff enacted a more aggressive enforcement <br />campaign to ensure that outdoor dining areas located within the public right-of-way met minimum <br />sidewalk clearances and held valid permits. Railings were required to be affixed to the sidewalk; <br />however, it appears that some of the fixed railings are now loose, causing encroachment into <br />sidewalk areas. Staff will conduct a site visit over the coming weeks, and work with business <br />owners to bring any non-conforming dining areas into compliance. <br /> <br />More broadly, if Code Enforcement, generally, is to be more of a priority, it would be necessary to <br />provide more resources to allow for proactive enforcement downtown, beyond the current <br />complaint-based approach.1 <br /> <br />D. Downtown Business Attraction and Investment <br /> <br />1. Downtown Vacancies/Tenant Improvements <br />Concerns have been raised about the number of Downtown vacancies and slow pace of <br />construction for some tenant improvement projects. Staff recently conducted a review of Main <br />Street business vacancies, noting a total of 14 vacant businesses. Six of these are storefronts <br />that are vacant and have no current leasing activity (to staff’s knowledge); a further eight have <br />current leasing activity of which staff is aware, or tenant improvements under construction. <br />Attachment 2 summarizes the status of Main Street vacancies as of March, 2026. <br /> <br /> <br />1 The outdoor pergola at Inklings was observed as being in poor condition/dry rotted and possibly dangerous. Building Division <br />staff inspected the pergola and agrees it is need of repair to be safely occupied. A “red tag” was applied to the pergola, with <br />notification to the business owner on March 9, 2026.