webinars
Beyond the Coin: Optimizing Meter Collections and Fighting Fraud with Operational Visibility
July 16 at 1pm (PST)
Metered parking operations are prime targets for inefficiencies, revenue leakage, and fraud. But what if we flipped the script? By applying proven enforcement strategies like “Saturation Patrols” to meter collections and integrating smart technology, we can turn traditional pain points into operational strengths. This session combines field-proven tactics with modern fraud detection and prevention strategies to help parking leaders reclaim control, optimize collections, and foster public trust.
Attendees will explore:
- How increased visibility and community engagement deter fraud.
- Best practices for secure, efficient meter collection processes.
- Technology that prevents fraud before it starts.
- Real-world case studies demonstrating measurable improvements in revenue and compliance.
Walk away with tools, templates, and tactics that are as practical as they are powerful.
Learning Objectives
- Understand the vulnerabilities in traditional meter collection processes.
- Explore high-visibility strategies (like saturation patrols) that enhance compliance and deter fraud.
- Identify technologies that support secure, efficient collections and real-time fraud detection.
- Apply real-world lessons from parking operations that increased revenue, reduced vandalism, and strengthened public trust.
Speaker Bio
Katherine Beaty is the EVP of Customer Experience at Tez Technology, where she oversees support, implementation, and operations teams. With over two decades in the parking industry, she blends deep operational expertise with a passion for fraud prevention and customer-centric innovation. Katherine holds an MBA and is a Certified Fraud Examiner. When she’s not streamlining parking ecosystems, she and her husband run a raptor rescue in Tennessee.
webinars
Frontline Professional Safety & Other Important Considerations
April 9 at 1pm (PST)
Frontline professional staff are the first point of contact for the public, playing a vital role in maintaining order, enforcing regulations, and fostering community trust. Despite their critical responsibilities, they often lack the structured safety training provided to sworn personnel, leaving them vulnerable to high-risk encounters and operational hazards. This session, led by Captain Nick Nicholas, provides practical, scenario-based training tailored specifically for non-sworn public safety personnel. Attendees will gain essential skills in situational awareness, risk assessment, personal safety, de-escalation techniques, conflict resolution, and customer service to enhance their effectiveness and safety in public-facing roles.
Beyond interpersonal safety, this training covers vehicle and operational safety, equipping personnel with best practices for working in high-risk environments, as well as stress management, resilience building, and overall wellness to help mitigate the mental and physical toll of frontline work. This session bridges a critical training gap, empowering professional staff to take ownership of their roles, increase their confidence, and reinforce their value as trusted representatives of their organization. Attendees will leave with actionable strategies to navigate their responsibilities with professionalism and preparedness.
Learning Objectives:
· Develop Situational Awareness and Risk Assessment Skills – Learn to recognize and mitigate potential threats in dynamic environments.
· Enhance Professionalism and Public Engagement – Strengthen community trust through effective communication, de-escalation, and conflict resolution.
· Improve Personal and Operational Safety – Implement best practices for vehicle safety, stress management, and resilience building to support long-term well-being.
Speaker:
Captain Nick Nicholas serves as a Police Captain, overseeing his city’s parking management program while bringing nearly two decades of experience in public safety and emergency response. With a deep understanding of crisis management and frontline operations, he has developed training programs that emphasize professionalism, visibility, and community engagement.
As a former Public Information Officer (PIO), he mastered the art of effective communication, helping bridge the gap between agencies and the public. His ability to "speak" both officer safety and parking and mobility makes him a unique authority on the evolving role of frontline personnel.
A recognized industry leader, Captain Nicholas earned the NPA 40 Under 40 Award and is a published author in numerous parking industry publications. He is a sought-after speaker at national conferences, including SWPTA, NPA, and PIE, where he shares actionable strategies to keep frontline personnel safe, empowered, and engaged. His expertise in public safety, parking enforcement, and community trust allows him to provide real-world solutions that help frontline professionals take ownership of their roles while building stronger connections with the communities they serve
Past Webinars
SWPTA WEBINARS CAN BE VIEWED ON THE SWPTA YOUTUBE CANNEL
Remaining sane while managing a changing workforce Webinar 11.13.24
Presented by: Heather M. Nash, Ph.D.
As the workforce becomes increasingly diverse and multigenerational, supervisors are increasingly finding that managing people is the most stressful part of their positions. This presentation will focus on highlighting some of the key concerns and difficulties of supervising a younger workforce, as well as strategies for navigating potential conflicts, supporting supervisees’ needs while managing business needs, encouraging resilience among supervisees, and managing our own stress in the meantime.
Learning objectives:
- Learn how to build, create and maintain a highly diverse work staff.
- Understand conflict resolution, mental health and work life balance for all levels of the work unit.
- Identify and implement business needs with needs as a supervisor and needs of support staff.
Career Development 8.21.24
Presented by: Dr. Ron Brown, Senior Consultant of Educational Strategy and Partnerships at Global Education Consultants, LLC
"Career Development: Strategies for Skill Enhancement and Advancement" provides a comprehensive overview of effective strategies for professional growth and skill improvement.
Attending this webinar underscores the importance of setting clear, achievable career goals using the SMART framework and discusses how to identify and address skill gaps that may hinder career progression. It presents a variety of strategies for skill enhancement, such as continuous learning through workshops, seeking mentorship, joining professional organizations, and embracing challenging projects. Join us on a journey towards an exciting a satisfying career. Once registration is open, make sure to secure your spot.
Parking Happiness 7.24.24
Presented by: Tobias Marx, City of Bend
Parking Happiness isn’t just a lofty and crazy idea: it’s critical to move the parking and mobility industry into the future. Join us for a conversation about how Parking Happiness can be achieved, managed and maintained.
We’ll discuss:
· Parking Happiness = ?
· The keys to Parking Happiness
· How to move from Status Quo to Innovation
If you’ve ever wanted to take your parking operation to the next level and if you wished that parking would not always be reviewed as negative but has the potential of supporting quality of life and economic mobility, you won’t want to miss this. Please come prepared with questions for the Q & A portion of our chat.
Curb Management 6.5.24
Presented by: Tobias Marx, Jason Sutton, Danielle Elkins, Kevin Huff
The concept of Curb Management has generated significant buzz in our industry, yet there remains a lack of consensus on what exactly it entails. In today's rapidly evolving urban landscape, effective Curb Management is essential for addressing competing demands at the curb, adapting to changes in mobility patterns, accommodating the rise of on-demand services, and emphasizing sustainable transportation.
Join us for a panel discussion with industry thought leaders who will delve into not only the definition of Curb Management but also its complexities. We will explore several key topics, including:
Digitally defining your curb, understanding the activities on your curb, and optimizing your curb policy with data.
· Why parking plays a pivotal role in Curb Management.
· How Curb Management represents not merely a challenge to be met, but an unprecedented opportunity for the Parking Industry.
· Participants will get a good understanding of the 'what' and uncover the 'why' and 'how' behind Curb Management through valuable insights from industry and thought leaders.
Emergency Management: More Than Just Fire & Police Response 2.28.24
Presented by: Robert Church, CEM, MEP, CPM
Emergency Management uses the Whole Community approach to Mitigate, Prepare, Respond, and Recover from large-scale emergencies or disasters. Often emergency management is viewed as “that stuff fire and police do”. It is much more than that.
This presentation will provide a high-level overview of the components of emergency management and how they integrate with various community resource partners such as Public Works, Mass Care, Public Health, Energy, Transportation, Communications, and Cross-Sector Infrastructure.
We will examine more closely the Incident Command System (ICS) and how it is used as the basis for the command and control structure for integrating these various community resource partners for responding and recovering from an incident. This will include providing resources for receiving additional ICS and response-specific resource training opportunities.
SWPTA's 4th Annual Gingerbread Garage Contest 12.14.23
Categories are:
Most Realistic - Flowbird
Best Holiday Theme - Duncan Solutions
Most SWPTAstic (most unusual) - SKIDATA
Tallest - McCarthy
People's Choice - LAZ Parking
How to Train Your Sharks 4.26.23
Presenter by: Cristie Steffy, City of Monterey and Darby Garcia, NAU
This short session examines staff training, the need to train and how to train staff. A trained staff is a well informed and knowledgeable staff. A trained staff is also a staff that has confidence in the service they provide to a customer base. The benefits of training helps to boost workplace engagement, in addition to employee retention. Build workplace relationships through empowerment and development. A trained staff generally is a happy staff.
Learning Objectives:
- Develop Future Leaders
- Empower Employees
- Builds Workplace Relationships
- Understand the importance of training
Using Carefrontation to Confront Toxic Colleagues 2.15.23
In this seminar we will look at how to address confrontation and toxic staff, co-workers, and bosses in the workplace. Participants will learn pragmatic techniques and discuss their experiences in dealing with people who create confrontation, disruption, and even toxic work environments.
Learning Objectives:
- How to keep toxicity from spreading in the workplace
- How to deal with co-workers who create disruption in the workplace
- Finding solutions to toxic work environments
2022 SWPTA Conference in Las Vegas! 10.2023
Join Brandy Stanley to hear about what you can expect from the SWPTA Conference. If you haven’t been to a SWPTA conference, you are in for a real treat. If you’ve been before, this conference will not disappoint. We will talk about the fabulous educational sessions, the very unique networking events (including Top Golf, which has become a SWPTA staple) and we’ll be able to answer any questions you have about travel, hotel, transportation or the conference itself.
Opportunities and Challenges for Providing Electric Vehicle Charging at Parking Facilities
Presented by: Brian McGann, Walker Consultants
In this seminar we’ll explore what you must do, what you may want to do, and what you probably don’t want to do with regard to electric vehicle charging in a parking facility. We’ll discuss: • Compliance with standards • Planning for future needs • Using incentives • Types of chargers and how to pick the best fit • Maintaining the equipment • Monetizing the service The session will include a presentation and an opportunity for Q&A. Learning Objectives: • Know what type and number of chargers may best suit various situations • Learn how to plan for EV expansion • Understand the costs and potential income from EV charging
Managing and Leading Up (and down, and sideways)
Speaker: Steven Burrell, EdD, Northern Arizona University
This short seminar session examines managing and leading your boss and peers in addition to subordinates. Writers like John Maxwell have discussed 360 leadership for years. But strong leadership isn't enough in today's dynamic, fast-moving, and unpredictable situation. New research shows the importance of successfully influencing (managing) your boss and colleagues for business impact and career success. From this seminar, you will learn about resources and several essential skills and tactics for authentically communicating, collaborating, and building your influence to lead and manage in all directions Learning Objectives: Understand the importance of managing supervisors and colleagues for business impact and career success Learn about resources and essential skills and tactics for authentically communicating and collaborating Learn how to build your influence to lead and manage in all directions
How to find a solution: Procurement – the before and after
Speaker: Julie Dixon, Dixon Resources Unlimited
A presentation by Julie Dixon focused on the lessons learned from recent parking solicitations for services and integrated technology. Understand the importance of defining your needs before developing a solicitation specification. The presentation discussion will include the considerations that an Agency must evaluate to address their immediate needs and incorporate long term parking planning to ensure an adaptive solution that will evolve with your community. We will discuss potential policy updates that may need to be addressed prior to solicitation. The presentation will review procurement processes and discuss performance standards that should be considered when evaluating vendor solutions and define the ongoing measures that should be incorporated to ensure key performance and delivery. This is a popular session that will highlight the tips that you need to consider when evaluating new parking technology and outsourced services.
Learning Objectives:
1. Understand parking technology and service options and how to optimize performance
2. Review procurement practices and discuss lesson learns for recent solicitation processes 3. Define key performance indicators and learn how to prioritize measures for ongoing evaluation and assessment
Why “Collection Rate” is the Most Important Metric for your Parking Citation Program….and How to Calculate It
Speaker: Mike Nickolaus, Independent Consultant
Description
- What’s the difference between “collection rate”, “windshield rate”, “payment rate”, “closure rate”?
- What about partial payments and dismissed tickets?
- What if we can’t find the registered owner’s name and address?
- What figure should go in the numerator? Number of paid tickets? Dollar value? And what about the denominator?
- Over what time period should we calculate the rate?
- Doesn’t my software system have a report showing this number?
- Is there really a difference in collection rates between vendors?
If you run a parking program, you may have asked yourself these questions and others. Maybe you calculate your collection rate on a periodic or even regular basis. Or maybe you haven’t thought about it much because there’s a lot on your plate.
Did you know that accurately calculating and then regularly monitoring your collection rate is the most powerful tool you have and allows you to identify:
- Citation issuance errors and areas for PEO retraining
- DMV data problems and the value of skiptracing
- Missed noticing cycles
- Missed or delayed payment postings
- Additional sanctions or strategies that can improve compliance
- Issues with your adjudication process including your court
- Whether your processing vendor is delivering high quality service.
This webinar will lay a foundation for understanding the importance of collection rate and how to calculate yours.
Finally, we will discuss whether and how an agreed “collection rate” data standard could benefit the industry.
Learning objectives
As an attendee you will:
- Learn how to calculate your program’s “Citation Collection Rate”
- Understand the importance and variety of the information that can be gleaned from understanding your collection rate
- Learn how these insights will help you identify areas for improvement in your citation processing program
- Be better able to measure and compare your processing vendor’s performance.
Key take away: How to calculate your program’s citation collection rate
The Quirky World of Parking, Four Decades of Observations, One Parking Space at a Time.
July 14, 2021
Presenter: Larry J. Cohen, CAPP
Ever wanted to write a book about your parking experiences? If so, take this journey with Larry J. Cohen, CAPP as he shares with you the book writing process and tells some of the crazy stories from his 40-year career in parking management.
Learning objectives: A parking 101 masterclass in parking operations, leadership, management and conflict resolution.
Key take away: The stories discussed in the presentation will educate members in all areas of operations and prepare staff on how to best handle issues we deal with day-to-day.
Electrifying Transportation: Maximizing behavioral, economic, and environmental outcomes - May 19, 2021
Speaker: Josh Kavanagh, UCSD and Byron Washom, UCSD
UC San Diego built the world’s largest and most diverse university EV charging network and a user base of more than 2500 unique customers. How’d they do it? Deep partnerships among campus transportation, university’s research enterprise, industry, and grant-making entities all played a role and a laser focus on customer needs and infrastructure efficiency allowed them to go further and faster than their peers. Participants will learn how the UC San Diego team fine-tuned their recipe for success and how they’re both shaping user-behavior and EV parking demand. With the national discussion shifting toward infrastructure funding, you don’t want to miss this discussion on how to best position your program and new funding opportunities that are on the horizon.
Listen Here
Inhabited Vehicles - April 21, 2021
Speaker: Christina Jones, Walker Consultants
The nomadic lifestyle represented by inhabited vehicles has grown exponentially over the last decade—by some estimates, over 300% in the last 3 years. These vehicle inhabitants by choice are adding to the existing population of those inhabiting vehicles due to housing challenges, also growing in number as living costs rise during the economic downturn. Inhabited vehicles parked on-street reduce turnover of parking supply, create environmental issues, and contribute to congestion and unsafe travel conditions. This webinar presents regulations and programming in use throughout the Mountain Region and West Cost intended to mitigate the impacts of these vehicles on the parking system, including a discussion of several successful partnerships and their challenges and outcomes. Learning Objectives: 1. Identify the typical impacts common types of vehicle inhabitants have on on-street parking. 2. Explore examples of current regulations and programming in use. 3. Learn about steps to effectively address the challenges related to parking inhabited vehicles on-street.
Workplace Resiliency Webinar: Calming in Critical Moments - March 17, 2021
In this 40-min webinar, participants will learn: What resiliency actually is and the benefits of integrating it into our lives • A little science behind just how this all works • The primary components of building resiliency • Most importantly: 1. How to prime ourselves for Resiliency 2. How to practice Resiliency daily 3. How to build a culture of Resiliency for your team . Listen Here
Speaker: Dr. Patrick Jeffs
Pandemic Recovery - February 17, 2021
Panelist: Brandy Stanley, Donovan Durband, Andy Cushman and Jim Sayre
Please join us for an updated pandemic recovery panel discussion. Our panel consist of professionals from municipalities, university, airport and hospital parking operations: Brandy Stanley – City of Las Vegas, Donovan Durband – City of Tucson, Andy Cushman and Jim Sayre – University of Arizona. From a customer/driver perspective: What does recovery look like? How long do we see impacts? Plans for pandemic resurgence? Join us for a lessons learned, how we are coping and what our new “normal” is looking like as we maneuver back into cities re-opening, people coming back to work and navigating ripples. Listen Here
Threats to Parking Services: Cyber Security Briefing and Best Practices to Avoid the Unthinkable
Description: Let's face it, Parking Services can be a prime target for persons seeking to disrupt operations or other nefarious actions. This 1 hour webinar will examine the current threat landscape and hacker methods for breaching technology systems. We will identify security program best practices that any organization can follow, and sources of information and assistance. Questions and discussion on security issues will focus on participants' specific interests or needs.
Participants will learn:
• The landscape of current cyber security threats.
• Sources of information and assistance on security issues.
• Essential methods and practices for ensuring secure operations.
Participants will have access to a website with presentation slides and resources for future reference.
Spokane, WA - Emergency Management: Parking in the Time of COVID-19 - 1 CAPP Point
While parking is often an afterthought in the face of a public health emergency, flexible parking management is one of the keys to creating the framework within which communities can reduce vulnerability and cope with disasters. Successful approaches to parking management can enable adaptive emergency response, maximize access to parking assets and curbside real estate when they’re most needed, and quickly get people back to work in times of uncertainty. This session will explore various approaches to municipal parking management in the time of COVID-19, identifying policies and procedures that allowed the parking team to get involved early in the emergency response and support the Emergency Operations Center (EOC). Hear from the City of Spokane’s parking team about their parking challenges leading up to COVID, the pandemic impacts and the ongoing trials and tribulations managing parking in this current environment.
Evolving from "Nice to have vs. Got to Have" - November 10, 2020 - 1 CAPP Point
Description: Presentation Summary: In this session, Brian and Tammy will outline the template to becoming part of someone’s everyday operation. They will identify key areas where failures occur, use data to validate areas to target and root causes, and provide a roadmap to overcoming obstacles. This includes concepts such as process change, communication links and employee training. They will also demonstrate how to keep key stake holders in the loop, as part of the decision making process. And lastly, they will explain how to report on progress and ongoing maintenance.
Listen to the Webinar Here
The Customer Experience Transformation - From zero to paid parking in Paso Robles - October 21, 2020 - 1 CAPP Point
The City of Paso Robles is an increasingly popular tourist destination with a vibrant downtown. In 2018, the City didn’t have a single time limit or parking meter, the parking municipal codes hadn’t been updated since the 1950’s, and the community’s perception of parking challenges was varied. This session will describe the City’s innovative approach to overcoming long-entrenched parking challenges and walk through the creative, hands-on, and even aggressive strategies that enabled the City’s warp speed transformation. Hear firsthand from the Police Department, Assistant City Manager, Parking Ambassador, and other key City staff about Paso Robles’s transformation over the past two years, the array of parking technologies that have been introduced, and how the City incorporated customer service and outreach as a key element of the revitalized program. Learn how this new and small program is surviving post-COVID19.
When Your Parking Lots Are Not Parking Lots, What Are They? - September 23, 2020 - 1 CAPP Point
How to manage paid parking operations and relocate transportation services while maintaining service excellence. This presentation will discuss parking operations at country’s second largest convention center, the Las Vegas Convention Center with over 4.8 million square feet of space and 5,000 – 10,000 surface parking spaces which are converted to outdoor exhibit space, race tracks, or massive equipment displays throughout the year hosting hundreds of thousands of attendees during a single event. How do they do it? This presentation will give you insight into the planning and execution of traffic control and event planning, off site parking management and creating pop up transportation centers for show such as SEMA and Con Expo.
Learning Objectives:
· How to manage Customer Service in Security and parking
· Meeting the challenges and required flexibility with positivity
· Thinking outside the box
· How to work with outside agencies
· Networking net worth
· Technology disruptions Dealing with Uber and Lyft
Pandemic Recovery: The Road to Recovery - July 8, 2020
Please join us for a pandemic recovery panel discussion. Our panel consist of professionals from municipalities, university, airport and hospital parking operations: Brandy Stanley – City of Las Vegas, Donovan Durband – City of Tucson, Andy Cushman and Stephanie Barnes – LAZ Parking, and Jim Sayre – University of Arizona. From a customer/driver perspective: What does recovery look like? How long do we see impacts? Plans for pandemic resurgence? Join us for a lessons learned, how we are coping and what our new “normal” is looking like as we maneuver back into cities re-opening, people coming back to work and navigating ripples.
Curbside Management: Best Practices - June 12, 2020
The curb is simple, right? Sidewalk, maybe some landscaping, travel lanes…not anymore. With the advent of Transportation Network Companies, the permeation of new micro-mobility options like e-scooters and e-bikes, increasing pressures to use public spaces to supplant tight municipal budgets, and the looming presence of autonomous vehicles, the curb is becoming complicated. Join us for a workshop on how you can take control of the right-of-way and bring the most value to your precious curb.
Speaker: Mallory Baker, Walker Consultants
Execution - May 13, 2020
This webinar discusses linkages between strategic intent and desired outcomes in the context of plan execution. We will identify obstacles to effective execution of plans and the tactics for developing teams that are highly engaged in producing consistent results. We will also look at leadership qualities, and self-inspection of what it takes to create a culture of high-performing teams that execute. The limitations and motivators within our higher education environments will be considered. Participants will develop a plan of engagement and staff development to improve teamwork, execution and desired future state culture for achieving strategic outcomes.
Parking, Pandemics and the Road Ahead - April 7, 2020
SWPTA is joining with the Middle Atlantic Parking Association on this all important webinar on how members from across the industry (including private operators, municipalities, educational institutions, and vendors) are dealing with the realities of the COVID-19 pandemic and how we can plan for success in the weeks, months, and years ahead.