Spending as the Clock Ticks

I recently made the mistake of doing some holiday shopping at the Santa Monica Place mall. I parked in the city-owned parking garage that is connected to the mall after I noticed the sign that stated, “3 Hours Free Parking” in large letters. I assumed Santa Monica was giving me a holiday gift of three free hours of parking. How festive, I thought.

After spending hundreds of dollars shopping and eating lunch, I returned to my car to find Santa Monica’s real stocking stuffer under my windshield wiper: a parking ticket for $38 for parking longer than three hours.

Isn’t it underhanded of Santa Monica to lure shoppers into its parking structure under the guise of something free, only to punish them with a parking ticket? The city seems to have set up a shopping spree contest. The sign out front should say, “Finish all of your shopping in less than three hours and you win a prize: You won’t have to pay the $38 it costs to spend your money here.” Isn’t this petty little game of “Beat the Clock” a nasty way of treating the visitors and tourists Santa Monica depends on?

How do the many merchants in the mall feel about their would-be customers having a time limit placed on them like schoolchildren at recess? I wonder how the manager of Macy’s feels when he overhears statements like: “Sorry, I don’t have time to look at those diamond earrings for mother, my time is almost up in the parking garage. The clock is ticking.”

Raising revenue for the city is no excuse for issuing these mean-spirited citations. Wouldn’t the city raise more revenue by simply charging a flat fee or charging by the hour like every other parking garage in Santa Monica?

As a consumer, I am more than willing to pay a fair price for parking my car, but $38 seems like a very high price to pay. The Grinch could take lessons from the callous Scrooges of Santa Monica who are stealing the holiday season from consumers and merchants alike.

Robert Roman is a Los Angeles-based writer.