Adam Ferguson
Airport officials wrapped the first phase of the airport expansion project Oct. 30.
The start date for fees to park at the Santa Fe Regional Airport is—no pun intended—up in the air.
Officials announced the pending restart to paid parking—originally slated to begin Dec. 1—following completion of the first phase of updates to the airport. However, after an issue within an agreement with the credit card vendor, Airport Manager James Harris tells SFR the timeline will be set back at least a few days.
“We should have it ready by the end of the week,” Harris says.
Finance Director Emily Oster tells SFR the vendor Windcave has been working with airport officials to set up the payment system for parking. Windcave was initially expected to provide both gateway and merchant services.
A gateway facilitates online transactions and allows them to be processed, while merchant services refer to a holding account where payments land before being deposited into a regular bank account.
However, once the Finance Department became involved and reviewed the agreement, Oster says the team noted “a concern…related to compliance with contractual provisions” within a separate contract the City of Santa Fe has with Wells Fargo Bank as its fiscal agent which gives the bank “the exclusive rights” to all merchant services and would have placed the city in violation. This, she adds, led to an amendment to the agreement, making Windcave the gateway while Wells Fargo takes over merchant services.
Harris says city officials are “all set” on the Wells Fargo side as of Dec. 2. Windcave will now test the new system before it goes live.
Following the oversight in the agreement, Oster says “the key takeaway” is that her department will request that its Treasury Division be involved in all projects with a payment acceptance component “as early as possible” moving forward.
“That will help us identify these issues early on and work with other departments on solutions,” she says.
Once parking fees begin, those who visit the airport will get the first 30 minutes of parking free, followed by a set rate of $7 per day.
