By Gretchen Webster

WESTPORT — A policy governing electric vehicle charging stations in town-owned parking lots — setting user fees and fines for parking at the stations longer than three hours — was approved Wednesday by the Board of Selectwomen. 

The new policy is part of ongoing efforts to coordinate. parking downtown in more uniform and equitable ways.

Ownership of electric vehicles in Westport has surged in the last dozen years, growing from six EVs registered locally in 2011 to 1,447 this year, according to Tom Kiely, operations manager for the Selectwomen’s Office.

“It’s quite the increase,” and one of the highest per capita rates of electric vehicles ownership in the state, he said. “This policy … should help prevent people from monopolizing those chargers for extended periods of time. That’s one of the biggest complaints I get in my office.”

Under the new policy, the cost for charging electric vehicles at the charging stations will be 35 cents per kilowatt hour with a three-hour time limit.

For those charging at EV spaces, a notification will be sent at the three-hour mark to the vehicle owner’s cell phone, with a 15-minute grace period to return to the car. If the car is not moved, there will be a $10 per hour idling charge assessed at $2.50 per 15-minute intervals, Kiely explained.

For the charging stations at the Saugatuck and Greens Farms railroad stations, however, there will be no three-hour limit, Kiely said. Commuters already pay a railroad parking permit fee, and can’t be expected to return to their vehicles to move them in compliance with a time limit.

The new policy will also penalize drivers of both electric and non-electric vehicles who park in charging spaces without using them for charging.

The charging stations policy and and new regulations imposing a three-hour parking limit for standard spaces downtown will take effect sometime in the new year after signs designating the three-hour spaces are installed, Kiely said. The signs have arrived, but will be installed after the holiday rush is over, he said.

Westport has 16 electric vehicle charging stations in town-owned parking lots, plus 16 more at the railroad lots. There is also a plan to install charging stations in the parking lot at the Westport Center for Senior Activities, Kiely said after the meeting.

The fees will help the town cover its costs for electricity that powers the charging stations, as well as for maintenance, replacement when necessary and the equipment’s software, Michael Frawley, superintendent of facilities for the town, told the selectwomen.

“It is really recouping our costs. We’re really not making any money,” he said.

Kiely, responding to questions from Selectwoman Candice Savin, said the time it takes to charge an electric vehicle depends on the size of its battery, the speed in which it can take a charge and other factors. “It could be anywhere from $30 to $40 to go from empty to full,” he said.

“I have heard chatter around town that people who aren’t charging are using those spaces,” Selectwoman Andrea Moore said in support of the new rules.

First Selectwoman Jennifer Tooker, who attended the meeting remotely, said that developing the electric vehicle charging policy encountered technological challenges and other problems during the year it has been under consideration.

“Now we’re in a great place operationally on these charging stations,” Tooker said. “We need to make sure our parking circulates appropriately for our retailers and our restaurants.”

Also speaking in favor of the new policy was Barry Kresch, a Westport resident and president of the EV Club of Connecticut, who said he supports charging a per kilowatt hour rate.

The Connecticut municipality with the largest number of registered electric vehicles is Greenwich, followed by Stamford, with Westport coming in third, according to statistics on the EV Club of Connecticut’s website.

Connecticut Department of Motor Vehicle figures posted on the club’s website show there has been a 43 percent increase in electric vehicles registered in the state between July 2022 and July 2023.

Freelance writer Gretchen Webster, a Fairfield County journalist and journalism teacher for many years, was editor of the Fairfield Minuteman newspaper for 10 years and teaches journalism at Southern Connecticut State University.