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SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
City councillors say they were left in the dark after administration quietly tightened the rules earlier this year for seniors' parking passes.

Bill Adkins points to a city seniors' parking meter pass at the Baker Centre on Tuesday. The city began enforcing restrictions on seniors passes this year, which was a source of frustration at a city council committee meeting Monday. - Simon Whitehouse/NNSL photo

Up until this year, any Yellowknife resident, including seniors living on the Ingraham Trail, could expect free parking downtown at all parking meters, save for nine-hour meters, once they turned 60 by merely showing their driver's licence to a clerk at city hall. According to the city between 150 and 200 passes are handed out each year.

The city's parking permit policies state exemptions for seniors are only given if they "are retired and on a fixed income" but that rule has not been enforced until recently, according to city councillors at Monday's committee meeting.

Now city councillors are hearing seniors are being turned away, including those on the Ingraham Trail, because they live outside city limits.

City councillors expressed frustration that they didn't know about the restrictions until hearing about it from angry seniors.

"I don't know whether the policy that is in place indicates that the intent was to provide parking passes to seniors at 60 years old on fixed income or retired," said city councillor David Wind. "Means testing is something that would not be well-received, I don't think, by the target population."

Outgoing city councillor Amanda Mallon criticized administration for getter tougher on seniors' passes, which are green cards placed inside the windshield, without seeking council approval.

Councillors say complaints from seniors began to mount in the late spring and early summer and have continued up to the last week largely due to the provision that states people living outside city limits can't get the exemption.

"In the last week I have heard of three individual complaints," said Mallon, pointing out that it hurts seniors who live on the Ingraham Trail. "If the issue is that we no longer give it to people who live outside the boundaries, then that discussion should have been had."

Sandra Taylor, president of the Yellowknife Seniors' Society said she is confused by the term "fixed income."

"I don't know how they can define a fixed income. If somebody has worked for the government, they have a government pension, Canada pension and an Old Age pension. Is that a fixed income? I don't know."

Mayor Gord Van Tighem said he sent an e-mail to council earlier in the summer when the complaints began. The e-mail included a document called "City of Yellowknife Parking Permit Policies."

"Back in June or July I got a couple of inquiries from a few seniors who asked for a parking policy and I circulated it to councillors," said Van Tighem. "Some of the seniors were saying (the policy) had changed in that they had a parking permit before and they couldn't have one now because they had commercial plates or they didn't live in town."

Dennis Marchiori, director of public safety, explained that most of the document includes policies that the city has had in place for 20 years but hasn't necessarily executed.

"Municipal Enforcement Division has used something similar to this document for 20 years but what we wanted to do this summer was because we had terms where we had both of our clerks go on (holidays) and had other people filling in, we needed something for the people who were filling in at the counter to understand how the different parking passes are done," said Marchiori during the meeting.

Marchiori said some changes in practice were implemented this summer, including that passes be only given out to people residing within city boundaries and that they be issued only to personally registered vehicles, as opposed to commercial, public service or government-registered vehicles.

Mallon, who was defeated in last week's election, said the issue of seniors passes was one she faced on the campaign trail and the issue came up during the election forum, even though council never had input into the changes.

"I guess the original intent may have been that it was for seniors on a fixed income who were retired but that intent was never communicated to the public," she said.

"There seemed to me to be a number of changes worthy of discussion at the council level because I knew that (the information) could roll out to the public very poorly and council would have to end up dealing with it anyway."

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