While many employees of St. Luke's Hospital in Duluth are used to having to plug meters for parking, cost for them is going up not once, but three times in 2023.

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It's not much to start, on January 1, it goes from $0.25 per 40 minutes of parking to $0.25 per 30 minutes.  That is about a $1.00 increase per 8-hour shift.  A buck a day might not seem like much, but over a year, the City of Duluth will be snagging around $260 from your average Monday-Friday hospital employee to start.

Adding to that, the fees are set to increase on April 1st, and July 1st.  It's a shame really considering back in 2020, Duluth's Mayor Emily Larson was all about thanking the frontline workers.  Though, all they received then was the lighting up of the Duluth Aerial Lift Bridge and Enger Tower.  Oh, that's right, there was also a parade outside of the two major Duluth hospitals put on by the City's Fire and Police Departments.

Not only will this increase put more financial strain on our hospital employees, but it will also cause many to park farther away from the hospital campus to avoid parking fees.  This will most likely cause strain on parking for local residents as well.

Thank you, hospital employees, for being heroes during COVID-19, here's a parking rate increase from your wonderful city and if you don't like it, park even farther away to walk to work in the winter.

I understand a city needs to make money but hitting the hospital employees in the wallet is not the way to do that.  The City of Duluth ought to be ashamed of themselves.

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