The Citywide Parklet Program
Parklets are the dining decks that sit in street parking spaces. The Council made them permanent citywide in December 2023 on a 5 to 2 vote, with rules on size, placement, and design. Restaurants build and maintain their own, and each one must sit within the restaurant's own street frontage.
- Restaurants: a permanent option to serve outdoors, at their own cost and upkeep.
- Drivers: every parklet occupies parking spaces.
- Pedestrians and diners: street space becomes seating.
- Adjacent businesses: the frontage rules exist because a neighbor's parklet sits close to their door.
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A parklet is a structure used exclusively for outdoor dining, placed in one or more on-street parking spaces. Santa Barbara allowed them under pandemic-era authority until Council adopted permanent code 5–2 on December 12, 2023: Ordinance No. 6134, adding Chapter 9.180 to the Municipal Code. Its stated purpose is safe, visually appealing outdoor dining within parking spaces. It reaches the whole city but not outdoor business facilities authorized under Chapter 31.30, which are licensed separately. A parklet must sit in spaces entirely within the establishment's own frontage, extend no more than 80 inches from the curb, carry no roof, and be protected by barriers the City Engineer approves; it is barred from Coast Village Road and from streets with two or more travel lanes in one direction. Alcohol service and portable heaters are permitted, and adjoining establishments may build joint parklets. A license runs one to five years, is revocable, and confers no vested right. It costs $514 to pre-apply, $2,500 to apply and $24 per square foot a year, about $3,100 to $4,700 for the 130-to-195-square-foot parklets reported in 2024, amounts Council set in March 2024 and carried unchanged into the current schedule, plus planning and design review fees and, in the Coastal Zone, a coastal development permit. The chapter as adopted contains no sunset. The open question is whether the program should stay as adopted, loosen, tighten, price differently, or end.
The citywide parklet ordinance (No. 6134, adopted 2023-12-12) operates with recurring Council touchpoints — annual dining-license fees and program adjustments have continued to docket. State set at conversion from packet PKL-018, 2026-07-30.
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How this gets decided
Chapter 9.180 is Municipal Code: only Council can widen, narrow or repeal it, by ordinance — introduced at one meeting, adopted at another. A change would normally reach the Ordinance Committee first, where Council sent this program in 2023. Fees are separate, set by resolution on the annual citywide schedule, Resolution No. 2026-059.
Below that it is administrative. Eligibility is screened first in a non-public pre-application review — $514, up to 30 days, advisory and non-binding (.100 A). The Public Works Director issues, denies and enforces the license; a denial "is final and not subject to further administrative appeal" (.110 A). Design review may be administrative where the Director has adopted guidelines (.140 C); the record does not establish that any exist. Coastal Zone parklets need a coastal development permit, and no license issues until that process ends "including the expiration of any appeal period" (.130) — the one appeal window open to the public. Otherwise the chapter gives third parties no notice and no appeal. It does make applications "and all application materials" public records (.100 B), and lets the Director revoke a license and remove a lapsed parklet at the owner's cost (.180). A revoked licensee has 7 days to appeal to the City Administrator, whose decision is final (Ordinance No. 6134; program page). Under the authority this chapter replaced, Council heard such cases itself: on May 23, 2023 it denied six appeals of suspended outdoor-dining authorizations, three unanimously and three over dissents by Councilmember O. Gutierrez, joined by Councilmember Jordan on the one where a motion to uphold died for lack of a second (minutes).
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Who is affected
- Licensed establishments, their employees and customers, including diners who prefer sitting outside. The owner must build and maintain the parklet to the Americans with Disabilities Act and Title 24 Chapter 11B, and the Director may require a Certified Access Specialist report before a license issues and at any time during its term (.060 A).
- People who would otherwise park in those spaces. A parking space is 7 by 20 feet, about 140 square feet; a parklet sits "within one or more parking spaces" and with barriers may reach 96 inches from the curb, into a space 84 inches deep. Nothing caps how many spaces it takes beyond the establishment's frontage, adjoining establishments may build joint parklets, and no replacement space is required (.020, .050).
- Drivers, cyclists, pedestrians, delivery vehicles and accessible-parking users. Eleven siting rules bar a parklet from a red-curb no-parking zone, a blue-curb accessible space, a loading zone "unless a replacement loading zone is approved by the City Engineer," a space next to an intersection, alley or crosswalk, within 15 feet of a hydrant, anywhere blocking the safe path to an accessible space or utility and storm-drain access, and anywhere traffic makes it incompatible (.050 B).
- Neighbors and property owners on streets where parklets are allowed, and where they are not. The chapter permits alcohol service under the establishment's ABC license and portable heaters and lighting as the Fire Marshal approves, bars outdoor cooking and gas generators, and sets no hours limit and no noise standard (.060 E, F).
What the record says
- How it got here. June 27, 2023: a Sneddon/A. Gutierrez motion sent staff to the Ordinance Committee for "a citywide parklet program ... outside the Promenade," 6–1, No: Mayor Rowse (minutes). October 17: Council approved the program 5–2 (Noes: Councilmembers Friedman, Rowse) on an A. Gutierrez/Jordan motion taking staff's recommendation and adding that they did not want parklets on arterial roads, "excluding Coast Village Road from the action" — words the printed recommendation did not contain (minutes). November 7: pulled from consent, a motion to continue failed 3–3 (Noes: Friedman, A. Gutierrez, Mayor Rowse; Absent: Jordan) and a Friedman/Rowse motion to rescind October 17 was withdrawn unvoted (minutes).
- December 5 and 12, 2023 — introduced, then adopted, 5–2 (Noes: Councilmember Friedman, Mayor Rowse). The December 5 Jordan/Harmon motion added six compliance dates, now all past (minutes). On December 12 Council adopted Ordinance No. 6134 from pulled consent, amending it from the floor to let the design body specify "coloring, coating, or other aesthetic features of the traffic safety barriers" (minutes). A discrepancy is on file: the certification page names the Noes as Friedman and Harmon, with Mayor Rowse among the Ayes; this record follows the minutes.
- March 12, 2024 — fees set, 6–1 (No: Councilmember O. Gutierrez), as Resolution No. 24-023, on a Harmon/A. Gutierrez motion splitting the application fee into $150 upfront and the balance before issuance (minutes). Both sides were argued: operators said the fees were manageable but the barriers were not, one putting barrier delivery alone near $5,000; a Rose Café owner said the parklet let elderly and immune-compromised customers sit outside; and Mayor Rowse and Councilmember Jordan called $24 a square foot a bargain against commercial rent, for parklets they put at 130 to 195 square feet. The same account puts a finished parklet at $4,800 outside the Coastal Zone and over $10,000 inside, and says the March 14, 2024 barrier deadline would not be enforced at the time (Independent). Seventeen applications were filed by February 1, 2024; how many licenses exist now is not established.
- What outdoor dining costs elsewhere. Promenade facilities pay $2 per square foot a month, the same annual rate as a parklet; sidewalk dining under SBMC 9.95 costs $638–$1,277 to apply plus $320 a year (Resolution No. 2026-059). The Coastal Development Permit is priced two ways — $5,535 on the program page, $6,406 in the FY2027 schedule — and which applies is not established (program page).
- What a license is. One to five years, renewable on application, payment of a renewal fee, and a finding that the holder "has faithfully performed the terms of the license" (.160). The annual fee is paid in advance with "no refund ... for early abandonment or termination" (.150), and a parklet whose license has expired unrenewed may be removed at the owner's cost (.180 A).
- Different clocks. The platform's record shows a June 30, 2026 Council action, 5–2, to maintain the promenade until the Master Plan is implemented and return for Title 31 reauthorization — tracked on The State Street Promenade. That record is extracted from meeting-video captions and is not human-verified: its dissenters are inferred, not read from a roll call, and it is the only vote here not taken from approved minutes (video). Chapter 9.180 has no expiration date. The promenade shows what replacement looks like: in September 2025 the City cleared its 500 block of structures it calls parklets, moved dining to the sidewalk and added pedlets — elevated, ADA-accessible walkways letting pedestrians pass the dining zones (news release). The city puts the promenade at the 400–1300 blocks of State Street (outdoor business facility page).
- A negative finding. Searching the platform's Council corpus (2019–June 2026) for "parklet" in agenda-item titles on 2026-07-28 returns nothing after the March 2024 fee item. But only item titles were searched; a change folded into another item's title would not appear, and April–June 2026 coverage is thin.
How to be heard
- Council meets Tuesdays at 2:00 p.m. in the Council Chamber at City Hall; check the meetings page for the next date — it listed nothing beyond July when this packet was revised, 2026-07-29. Comment on an agenda item is taken when it is heard: 3 minutes, extendable by 2 if someone present yields time. Comment on a subject not on the agenda comes at the start of the 2:00 p.m. session, capped at 3 minutes. File a Request to Speak form first. Two mechanics matter: a consent item is open for discussion at the request of a Councilmember, staff or any member of the public — two actions above were pulled-consent — and the public may address the Finance or Ordinance Committee on a scheduled item (meetings page).
- Write to Mayor & City Council, P.O. Box 1990, Santa Barbara, CA 93102-1990; members are on the contact page. The program page carries program contacts and a "Subscribe to Parklet Update Emails" list, the one standing notification channel.
DRAFT — machine-drafted from the cited records on 2026-07-28, revised after neutrality audit round 1; awaiting the gate. Corrections: every claim above must trace to its linked source; report anything that doesn't.
Next Council meeting: Tuesday, September 1, 2:00 PM at City Hall, 735 Anacapa St.
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Email written comments to Clerk@SantaBarbaraCA.gov before the meeting begins. They go to Council and enter the public record.
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