BEVERLY HILLS—On September 14, the Beverly Hills City Council ultimately decided to decline the expansion of the current two-hour free parking at city-owned lots. This came after an initiative petition was filed for the March 2011 ballot mandating that the Beverly Hills City Council would have to implement a policy allowing for two hours free parking at specified lots owned by the city.

At the meeting, the city council noted that at present the majority of city-owned lots already offer two hours free parking and that the city’s current council has already extended the two hour free parking in Beverly Hills. However, in the end, the main concerns were lost revenue and the impact day-to-day operations would incur if the city were to adopt the two-hour free parking. Currently only a small number of lots offer one hour free parking.

After hearing that the city council failed to extend the two hours free parking across the board at city owned parking lots, the proponents decided to file a petition with the City Clerk so that the March 2011 ballot would include a measure that would require specific lots to comply with the proposed two hours of free parking.

At this point, the City Clerk will have to tabulate the names and signatures from the petition to verify if enough signatures have been collected to include the item in the upcoming March 2011 ballot.