I live near Balboa Park, and I want to be clear about something from the start: my opposition to paid parking has nothing to do with convenience — mine or anyone else’s. This isn’t about saving a few dollars at a meter for me.
It’s about who gets pushed out when we turn one of the last truly public spaces in San Diego into a revenue stream. It’s about foster youth on group trips, families stretching every dollar, seniors on fixed incomes, volunteers who give thousands of hours to the museums, and working people whose livelihoods depend on foot traffic in the park.
Balboa Park was never meant to be City Hall’s cash register. For more than a century, it has served as San Diego’s shared civic commons — a place intentionally gifted to the people with the understanding that access would be open, equitable and free. That promise is now under threat, not because the park failed, but because the city chose to use it as a shortcut to address a budget problem it created for itself.
On Feb. 9, the City Council will once again take up the issue of parking fees in Balboa Park. Council President Joe LaCava is proposing to suspend paid parking. I’ve introduced a different solution: the Balboa Park Parking Access and Fairness Ordinance, which fully repeals paid parking and restores free access permanently.
Those two approaches are not interchangeable.
A suspension keeps the paid parking ordinance alive. It leaves the enforcement system intact and allows fees to return at any time. It offers no certainty for workers, families, or volunteers, and no clear plan for reimbursing the thousands of San Diegans who already purchased annual parking passes in good faith. It preserves confusion and delay, while asking people to trust that the problem won’t come back.
A repeal does the opposite. It ends the policy outright. It dismantles the enforcement framework. It restores free access permanently. And it requires the city to fully refund all annual parking pass holders, no questions asked. That’s what the Balboa Park Parking Access and Fairness Ordinance does.
I’m pushing for repeal because paid parking in Balboa Park is not working and it never could have worked the way it was promised.
Since fees went into effect, the impacts have been immediate and real. I’ve met with restaurant workers inside the park are seeing fewer customers and fewer shifts. Museums are reporting drops in attendance. Volunteers — many of whom live outside city limits — are being treated like tourists in a park they help sustain. Families are doing the math before deciding whether a visit to Balboa Park fits into their budget at all.
For foster youth and group homes, those costs add up quickly. For low-income families, they become a barrier. For kids who deserve access to art, culture, and green space, paid parking quietly closes a door.
This policy functions like a regressive tax. It hits children, working families, seniors and low-income residents the hardest, while generating relatively modest revenue. That revenue shrinks further once enforcement costs, technology contracts, and lost economic activity are taken into account.
What makes this especially troubling is that the city reached for this policy without first looking inward. Instead of seriously examining layers of middle management or administrative bloat, the city chose to extract revenue from a public park. Balboa Park should not be the pressure valve for a deficit created by the city’s own decisions.
That’s why repeal must be paired with a better idea.
Alongside my ordinance, I’m proposing the Marston Balboa Park Partner Program — a voluntary, philanthropic-based approach to funding park infrastructure and maintenance without charging people to park. Named in honor of George Marston and the civic leaders who believed in investing in shared public spaces, this program would invite individuals, businesses, foundations and institutions to partner directly with the city to care for Balboa Park.
This program wouldn’t just raise funds — it would recognize civic leadership. Philanthropic partners would be honored through tasteful signage, plaques and acknowledgments throughout the park, celebrating those who step up to invest in one of San Diego’s most treasured public spaces. Instead of hiding revenue collection behind meters and enforcement, this model builds pride, transparency, and shared responsibility.
This is not a tax. It’s an opportunity.
San Diego has a deep philanthropic community that already supports our hospitals, universities, arts organizations, and cultural institutions. A structured Partner Program can generate millions of dollars annually through voluntary contributions and project sponsorships — funding restrooms, pathways, gardens, lighting, and long-overdue maintenance without placing the burden on families just trying to enjoy a public park.
Cities across the country fund their great parks this way. It builds goodwill instead of resentment, and investment instead of exclusion.
Historically, San Diego understood this approach. Civic leaders like George Marston and Alonzo Horton envisioned Balboa Park as a gift to the people, not a revenue experiment. Even the Organ Pavilion was gifted freely to the city with the expectation that access would remain open. Charging people to park just to experience what was given to them runs counter to that legacy.
Some argue that suspending parking fees is a reasonable compromise. But compromise only works if it solves the problem. A suspension delays it. Repeal fixes it.
On Feb. 9, the City Council will face a clear choice: pause a bad policy and hope the backlash fades, or repeal it and move forward with a fair, sustainable alternative.
Balboa Park belongs to all of the people. It should never be treated like city hall’s cash register.
Shane Harris is an ordained minister, publisher of San Diego Monitor News and the founder of People’s Association of Justice Advocates.
