‘Abating a nuisance’: Avon Town Council changes course on addressing private paid parking in town

Avon is rethinking its approach to regulating private parking in town.

After starting the process of creating a special business license for paid private parking vendors in December, the Town Council has redirected town staff to try meeting with the town’s most prominent paid parking vendor to reach reform.  

The Town Council changed course during its Feb. 10 meeting during a second reading — usually the end of the process — for the special business license.

History of parking controversy in Avon

Avon’s effort to regulate paid parking on private property was spurred by one big change that occurred in town in fall 2023.

In 2013, the Florida-based company Hoffmann Commercial Real Estate acquired a significant portion of the commercial property in downtown Avon.

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In fall 2023, the company decided to implement paid parking in its lots, charging fees 24 hours per day. Those who fail to register their vehicles and park for more than three hours receive a mailed ticket for $87. 

This was met with outrage and concern from many Avon residents and business owners, who spoke out at several Town Council meetings and other forums.

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Hoffmann Commercial Real Estate’s argument was that the town decided to implement paid parking in most town-owned lots and bays to prevent skiers heading to Beaver Creek from taking spots from shorter-term patrons visiting the town’s businesses and residents. 

The town’s managed parking program went into effect in December 2023.

Avon offers three hours of free parking, then charges $1 per hour for parking from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Those in violation of Avon’s parking regulations receive a $35 ticket placed on their vehicle by the town’s police department.

In response to complaints from Avon residents, business owners and visitors, the town organized a meeting with representatives from the company’s chosen parking subcontractor, Five Star Valet, and fee enforcement agency, Parking Revenue Recovery Services, in January 2024.

Last winter, Avon organized a survey that asked residents and visitors about their opinions on parking in town.

The town’s new law was initially set to be approved on Jan. 14, but Town Council pushed the final approval back to Feb. 10 after a request from a particularly interested member of the public: Alberto Castellon, senior vice president of Five Star Valet, the Naples-based operator owned by Hoffmann Family of Companies that runs the business’ paid parking lots in Avon. 

Castellon did not attend the Feb. 10 meeting, though he emailed town staff with thoughts on the proposed ordinance ahead of the meeting. There were no representatives of Hoffmann Commercial Real Estate present at the Feb. 10 meeting, online or in-person.

How Town Council changed course

The Town Council meeting began with a presentation from town staff on the adjusted special business license, which would have required paid parking vendors to display specific signage in their lots that included language on the maximum penalty for parking.

“Business licensing is a way of holding a business to certain standards,” said the town’s attorney, Nina Williams. “You can’t prohibit most businesses, and you can’t really regulate pricing … that would not fall into a town’s jurisdiction. Business licensing is the way to keep businesses compliance with everything, in this example, everything within this ordinance.”

But things took a turn when Mayor Tamra Nottingham Underwood took the microphone.

“I’m very frustrated and I even get angry,” Underwood said. “I’m astonished to see a landlord do this to its own tenants and those tenants’ customers, and then on the side, the ramifications for the rest of the town.”

“The signs are not the point. The bad behavior is what we need to work on, and we’ve got to get somewhere with it,” Underwood said. 

The town received more than 1,000 comments within 48 hours of deploying its survey about parking, said Town Manager Eric Heil. Most of the comments mentioned the $87 fine for failing to register to park. Many also said the parking situation influenced their interest in visiting Avon for the worse.

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard a complaint; I don’t think we’ve ever seen an email complaint about paying a legitimate price for parking. It is always this egregious $87 penalty that is so effective, offensive and is invoked, in my opinion, through means of entrapment. It is predatory and it is unacceptable,” Underwood said.

“I feel like we are abating a nuisance here,” Underwood said. “This $87 penalty that gets sent to our patrons of the town that shows up in the mail six, eight, 12 weeks after they parked and don’t even remember where they had their beer that afternoon, it’s a nuisance in our town under the legal definition of the word ‘nuisance.'”

In Colorado, a nuisance is legally defined as “unreasonable interference with the use and enjoyment of property.”

“It’s like mutually assured destruction the way it’s going right now, where they charge, we charge, now 30 Benchmark is charging,” said Councilor Gary Brooks.

To get to the root of the problem, Underwood suggested town staff go back almost to the drawing board and begin by trying to meet with representatives from Hoffmann Commercial Real Estate.

“I think this ordinance is only resulting in larger signs with more words and more licensing administration for our town clerk and will not result in behavioral change, which is what we really need,” Underwood said. “I think we need behavioral change by one landlord, property owner, in town. I would like to propose that we peel this way back to the beginning.” 

Or, as Brooks put it, “moving backwards to try to move forward.”

Meeting with Hoffmann Commercial Real Estate representatives about the parking situation worked once before, in fall 2023, when after a slew of complaints, the business adjusted its free parking frame from two hours to three and allowed parkers a longer period in which to register their vehicles.

The council discussed the town even peeling back some of its paid parking rules, even going as far as eliminating paid parking everywhere except the Avon Recreation Center and Avon Public Library, if Hoffmann Commercial Real Estate would agree to do the same.

“I know that we’ve invested a great deal, but I think that it would be a nice gesture to let our public know, and the people that shop and come visit here, that parking is free in Avon unless you have a landlord that wants to charge you,” said Councilor Ruth Stanley.

The Town Council voted to continue the public reading to its April 14 meeting to give town staff time to visit with Hoffmann Commercial Real Estate representatives and attempt to come to a collaborative solution.