SAN ANTONIO — More talks but no solutions to parking problems near the St. Mary’s Strip.
On Saturday—a second community meeting was held to discuss a proposed parking permit program.
It’s a complex issue among residents and business owners, but representatives on both sides are willing to work together.
St. Mary’s Street is already dealing with the mess of construction that could take another year to finish.
The conversation around a proposed parking program in the neighborhood isn’t much better.
“The way I explain it to someone is it’s like a bowl of jello that’s not firm at all,” Alfonso Robalin is interim president of the Tobin Hill Association and attended Saturday’s meeting.
“The discussion was much better than the first meeting, the location was better, the meeting was generally better,” Robalin thought while there was some improvement, others disagreed.
“It was another disorganized waste of time. We were essentially asked to write down possible solutions on index cards, tape that to a poster board and walk around the gym and kind of digest and assess that situation,” Aaron Pena, owner of the Squeezebox and Amor Eterno told KENS 5 on Sunday.
The city has proposed a parking permit program for only residents to park in residential streets around St. Mary’s from 10:00 pm to 6:00 am.
Pena doesn’t feel it’s a good idea.
We’re a part of this community as well, not just residents have access and a right to be a part of this community. We’ve operated as community members, and we’re willing to work on solutions, we’ve always been in favor of that,” Pena said he feels there’s some vocal neighbors that are anti-nightlife, although he says conversations with people like Robalin have been positive.
Councilman Mario Bravo, whose office hosted Saturday’s meeting, did not respond to KENS 5’s request for comment on Sunday.
Although the path forward isn’t clear, business owners and residents have a goal in mind.
“We want peace for the residents and prosperity for the businesses. We don’t want a strip from the 90’s that died, that’s not what we want,” Robalin said.
It's not clear when the next community meeting about the parking proposal would be held.