ALLENTOWN, Pa. – Allentown City Council held a joint meeting Wednesday night with the Allentown Parking Authority to allow the authority to review current and future initiatives and to give council and the public an opportunity to ask questions.

APA Executive Director Jon Haney made a presentation to council where he outlined some of the initiatives the authority is working on in 2026.

“The good things we’re doing don’t come without some challenges,” Haney said. “Like most cities, we have to deal with modernization. We’re taking a hard look at some of our parking ordinances to try to bring them up to speed and up to current date. Hopefully, at some point soon, we’ll have something to submit to council for review.”

Haney said the authority is looking at what technology options are available to help make a better parking system for residents of the city and visitors who come to Allentown.

“Financial challenges are always present,” Haney stated. “The APA has made strides thanks to some moves that the council made for us last around 2024, and those changes have allowed us to come back to a point where we’re back above water.”

But Haney added that some of the challenges the authority faces are with aging parking decks, many of which are close to 20 years old.

“Keeping those decks maintained and in good proper working condition is always a challenge and unfortunately very costly to take care of,” he said. 

Looking into the future, Haney said the authority would like to acquire more property to try and look at what it can do to expand the surface parking lots in densely populated neighborhoods that are very much in need of parking. Haney said in an interview that a surface parking lot is currently being constructed in the 400 block of Ridge Avenue.

“I mentioned before in visits here that the authority has invested significant revenue and resources into making sure there’s enough parking downtown,” Haney explained. “I still believe we’re in a good position with the available parking that we have, and the hope is to continue to provide parking relief where we can out in our neighborhoods.”

“We continue to embrace technology, and we have made some strides in our on-street parking to make it more accessible for folks, providing as many options as we can,” Haney said. “We have the kiosks which allow a number of different payment options, and we also have the mobile payment option that’s now available. We also still have old single-space meters sporadically around town, too. So, as we move forward into the future, we’re looking to bring those extra options to other blocks as well.”

Haney then spent over two hours answering questions from City Council members on all aspects of how the parking authority operates and how it enforces ordinances and its own policies.

Councilmembers asked specific questions related to topics such as: towing data, the success of the payment plan for tickets, training and culture among employees of the authority, residential parking permits, 24/7 parking enforcement and parking tickets.

Councilmember Candida Affa said the parking authority does a lot for the city.

“It’s a business trying to alleviate the problem of parking in the city, and it’s not an easy job,” Affa said. “It’s a necessary evil. Without the parking authority and the business that they do, we would not have the development we have right now. When they spend the money and buy property to put surface lots in in different areas, they’re doing it to alleviate parking problems.”

Affa said residents should try and attend parking authority board meetings.

“If you’re there and you listen to the process and what’s going on, you see a whole different light of what the parking authority is about,” Affa said.

AJ Knee, a resident of Old Allentown and a former parking enforcement officer for the APA, said everything he did when working for the authority focused on safety.

“Safety in parking has a lot of issues, and what I learned was that every day, the parking authority tries really hard to solve these complicated issues,” Knee said, “and I also learned that as an officer, it was a really great way to reach the community. 

Tilghman Street resident Betty Cauler questioned why the APA does not make an annual contribution to the city budget.

“Reading is the fourth largest city, Allentown is the third, and they (the Reading Parking Authority) just revisited their contract to give $1.25 million to the city,” Cauler said. “I don’t understand why other cities are able to do this, and we don’t get one penny from the parking authority.”

Council Chairman Santo Napoli said he spoke to a counterpart colleague on Reading City Council who told him that while the authority is giving money to the city, it is writing more parking tickets to pay for it.

Napoli said the special meeting Wednesday night was a great opportunity for council to have conversations and get questions answered by the authority.

“I think this is really beneficial for Mr. Haney to hear what we’re thinking and to hear what our concerns are,” Napoli said. “I think it’s a conversation that we can continue throughout the year, but this was a big step.”