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Parkland Events Task Force (PETF)* DRAFT POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS Page 1 of 10 DRAFT Recommendations Focus Area Menu A Applications and permits: B Planning and coordination: C Environment: D Fees: E Limits on events on parkland: F Alternative venues: G Impacts: H Fee waivers and City co-sponsored events: I Foundations and Non-profits: J Items Recommended for Inclusion in the Citywide Special Events Ordinance: K Other/Prior Action Items: *Parkland Events Task Force = PETF Parkland Events Task Force (PETF)* DRAFT POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS Page 2 of 10 A Applications and permits: As a principle, the PETF supports and encourages low and no-cost events (in terms of ticket price) in the Austin Park system. 1. Establish criteria for approving permit applications for events. City staff will use the planning evaluation matrix when reviewing potential and reoccurring events. SEE MATRIX 2. Adopt an ordinance to require a supermajority vote by the Council to override a staff approval or denial of an application for an event on City of Austin parkland. NOTE: A supermajority shall be defined as ⅔ of the Council, or eight votes. B Planning and coordination: 1. Establish a standing committee to help plan and coordinate events at the Long Center, Palmer Events Center, Vic Mathias Shores, and Butler Park. The committee should include representatives from adjacent neighborhoods, Long Center, Ballet Austin, Austin Symphony, Parks and Recreation Department, Palmer Events Center, Austin Opera, Daugherty Arts Center, event producers, Austin Parks Foundation, and Austin Center for Events (ACE). SEE FULL RESOLUTION “Direct the City Manager to establish a permanent committee that includes the Long Center, PARD, Palmer Events Center, Ballet Austin, Austin Opera, Austin Symphony, Daugherty Arts Center, adjacent neighborhoods, producers for events at Vic Mathias Shores, and Austin Parks Foundation to establish a permanent committee to coordinate and plan events at Town Lake Metropolitan Park.” 2. Recommendations from the PETF should inform the special events ordinance to help ensure consistent and unified special events policies. Parkland Events Task Force (PETF)* DRAFT POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS Page 3 of 10 C Environment: 1) Encourage events to utilize green event policies. a) The City should provide additional resources for enforcement. 2) NOTE - (Task force may revisit this section) Protect trees, vegetation, and environmentally sensitive areas. City of Austin PARD staff will define: a) Permissible ingress and egress access points for each park. b) Site circulation plan (traffic flow, etc) for each park. c) Clearly defined No-Go areas for driving, staging, and storage for each park. d) The City should provide additional resources for enforcement. e) The Parkland Events Task Force recommends the City implement a mandatory certification and training program for event organizers and contractors including tree protection, access and use of park grounds. The program should be evaluated for expansion to include the citywide permit process, permit requirements and conducting event business in the City of Austin. SEE FULL RESOLUTION 3) Develop a parking solution for Zilker Park that would help eliminate usage of the Polo Field for overflow parking. Parkland Events Task Force (PETF)* DRAFT POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS Page 4 of 10 D Fees: (NOTE - State laws and City ordinances limit fees to the actual costs to the City. Cities cannot make a “profit” on fees.) 1) Fee Study Recommendation. “In Fiscal Year 2017 conduct a thorough financial and operational fee study to determine whether fees charged for hosting special events in public places are appropriate for covering the cost of city-provided services and short-term and long-term maintenance of the public property and infrastructure used for the event.” SEE FULL RESOLUTION Considerations for the study should include whether or not the City can: a. Base fees on the total area of a park used for an event. b. Charge a premium rate for high-demand parkland. c. Increase user fees for Tier 4 events. d. Recalibrate maintenance and rental fees annually. e. Hold bonds/deposit long enough to identify damage to parkland. f. Direct user fees generated from events on parkland into a special purpose park fund that rolls over to the next parks budget year (without reducing general funds allocations or monetizing the parks). g. Additional items to be answered through analysis of fees: a. Can capital costs for parks be included in fees charged to events? b. Can fees be calibrated to include total City of Austin costs incurred by events? h. Obtain legal opinion on what mechanisms could be taken to charge rental fees at market rate instead of user fees. Parkland Events Task Force (PETF)* DRAFT POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS Page 5 of 10 E Limits on events on parkland: 1. Adopt changes to current limits on events at Zilker Park, Vic Mathias Shores, and Fiesta Gardens. a. Recommendations for All Noted Sites  Event producers, neighborhoods and the City will work together to mitigate parking, traffic, noise, trash, and environmental impacts.  Adopt an ordinance requiring a supermajority vote by the City Council to recommend increases to these limits. SUMMARY RECOMMENDATIONS SEE FULL DRAFT WORK PAPER Park Proposed Event Day Limits (current status) Zilker Park Proposed 24 event day limit via attrition/ incentives (Currently 29 event days) Auditorium Shores Proposed 17 event day limit via attrition/ incentives  Retain overall 25 event-day limit (Currently 20 event days out of 25) Fiesta Gardens/ Festival Beach Proposed 17 event day limit via attrition/ incentives (Currently 19 event days) 2. Recommend policy to include outdoor events on Long Center property in limits on events at Vic Mathias Shores. SEE FULL RESOLUTION note – change to new resolution link 3. Create incentives for the relocation of events at Zilker Park, Vic Mathias Shores, and Fiesta Gardens that do not require the entire space to other venues to help minimize the impact and closure of streets. o NOTE - Include specific mention of underutilized venues 4. Fireworks and impact to trail usage. a. Establish a consistent criteria for display of fireworks in parks. b. Limit fireworks to 4th of July and New Year’s Eve at Auditorium Shores. Parkland Events Task Force (PETF)* DRAFT POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS Page 6 of 10 F Alternative venues: 1. Identify parkland in East Austin for potential events. SEE FULL RESOLUTION  “In the Request for Proposals for creating a new Master Plan for Walter E. Long Metropolitan Park, include in the scope of work for the Master Plan evaluation of using Walter E. Long Metropolitan Park as an alternative event venue for hosting large special events; and  Include funds in the Fiscal Year 2017 budget for studying the feasibility, requirements, and estimated costs for developing the existing publicly-owned land at Bolm Road and the Johnny Trevino Metropolitan Park as alternative event venues that can accommodate large special events in addition to providing new public park space for the growing Austin population; and  In Fiscal Year 2017 conduct a thorough financial and operational fee study to determine whether fees charged for hosting special events in public places are appropriate for covering the cost of city-provided services and short-term and long-term maintenance of the public property and infrastructure used for the event.” 2. Establish criteria for designating a park as a special event venue. From the Alternative Spaces Subcommittee, the following criteria should be utilized when designating a park as a special event venue: a. Size and capacity b. Development timeline c. Development status d. Bond funding e. Accessibility f. Bikeable/walkable g. Distance to residential h. Rating for hotel access i. Existing infrastructure j. Traffic concern 3. Recommend full funding for master planning Johnny Trevino Jr. Metropolitan Park within the FY 16-17 concept menu. Parkland Events Task Force (PETF)* DRAFT POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS Page 7 of 10 G Impacts: As a principle, the PETF supports establishment of higher standards, and provision of required (instead of devote) resources towards fees, impact mitigation and limits for heavily used parkland. 1. Establish impact zone and special event zone to facilitate planning and management of events on parkland. 2. The task force recommends immediate implementation of a Special Events Permit Parking (SEPP) Program for neighborhoods that are in or adjacent to the special event impact zone with specific priority focus on the Zilker, Bouldin and Festival Beach area neighborhoods. The program shall be established with focus on increased fines for parking, changes to City procedure and practice to encourage effective towing or booting authorization and ticketing by non-sworn personnel. City staff shall pilot the program no later than the Fall of 2016. SEE FULL RESOLUTION 3. Increase fines for parking and traffic violations in the impact zone. SEE FULL RESOLUTION 4. Strictly enforce towing in the impact zone. Increase Austin Police Department’s towing capacity during events. This will help reduce response times for towing and allow police officers to spend more time on enforcement. 5. Increase fines for unpermitted vendors located in the special event zone. 6. Increase staffing for the traffic management center during events to monitor traffic flow and signals in the impact zone for Tier 3 and 4 events that impact major roads during rush hour or peak traffic times. 7. Establish a temporary flagger team to augment police resources at key intersections during events to provide additional information and assistance to drivers and pedestrians. Incorporation of non-sworn personnel where possible. Parkland Events Task Force (PETF)* DRAFT POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS Page 8 of 10 8. Amend City codes to establish pedicab traffic flow enhancement zones during events. The traffic flow enhancement zone would designate approved and prohibited routes for pedicabs to help facilitate and enhance traffic flow. 9. Accommodate general park users that are displaced by events. Install signs to redirect them to nearby parks. 10. Encourage a sound impact plan for all special events with amplified music. 11. Encourage stakeholder meetings with affected neighborhoods to help plan and prepare for medium and large events. 12. Streamline setup and teardown process for events. 13. (Task force may revisit this section) Sound Ordinance revisions: 1. Amend City sound ordinances to require “C” weighting measurement in all sound limit regulations. 2. Provide funding for a sufficient number of sound meters that have A, and C weighting capabilities. 3. Amend Parks code to change sound curfew extension requests from the current 10 pm to 2 am to 10 pm to 11 pm. Parkland Events Task Force (PETF)* DRAFT POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS Page 9 of 10 H Fee waivers and City co-sponsored events: 1. Establish a policy that the Council may not waive damage deposits for events on parkland. 2. (NOTE – This item is under consideration by the PETF). Policies to waive fees and expenses for events cosponsored by the Council should be based on specific criteria: i. Significant public benefit to a local Austin-based non-profit. ii. Significant local public economic impact and public benefit. iii. Free, family-friendly and alcohol/tobacco free. iv. Environmentally friendly. I Foundations, Conservancies, Non-profits: (NOTE – These items are under consideration by the PETF). 1. Producers of events on public property must publicly disclose the amount of money or value of in-kind donations given to foundations and non-profits for each event. 2. Foundations that receive money or in-kind donations from events on public property must publicly disclose that information for each event. Determine if park conservancies and foundations can charge fees that exceed the cost of service for events on parkland. Parkland Events Task Force (PETF)* DRAFT POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS Page 10 of 10 J Items Recommended for Inclusion in the Citywide Special Events Ordinance: 1. Require each large event to conduct pre-event planning meetings with stakeholders that will be impacted by the event. 2. Require events to follow “green events” policies recommended by the PETF. SEE GREEN EVENT POLICIES 3. Rental and permit fees for street closures should be scaled to the street classification (neighborhood street, corridor street, major road, etc.). 4. Rental and permit fees for right-of-way (ROW) closures should be scaled to the size of the ROW and length of closure. 5. Fees for street and right-of-way closures should be set so that closures with larger impacts on traffic and public access pay higher fees. K Other/Prior Action Items: 08-09-16 recommendation - funding parks to national standard levels 08-09-16 - recommendation - economic study of park and city event