DENVER — Employees at the Cherry Creek Shopping Center are getting frustrated with mall management after weeks of feeling ignored.
Nathan Southerland, a director at one of the mall's stores, said he's trying to get clarity on the recent change in parking garage fees.
In 2017, the mall started charging customers for parking. Now, they want employees to pay $20 a month to park at their place of employment.
"There was a leak on Reddit about our parking garage at the Cherry Creek Shopping Center starting to charge the employees $20 per month to park in order to come to work," Southerland said.
He told Denver7 it wasn't until the following Monday that managers addressed employees themselves.
Right now, they pay a one-time $30 refundable fee to park. Starting April 1, the new changes go into play. That's $240 a year for one employee. Southerland estimates there area around 2,500 employees at the mall.
Mike Wilson, the mall's general manager, said free parking for employees was meant to be a "short-term benefit."
In a statement he said in part:
"Free tenant parking is not a benefit widely offered at other businesses in the Cherry Creek neighborhood other than those retailers who choose to pay for their employee's parking, many of those spaces are significantly more per month."
Employees still want to know why they have to pay now, and where the money is going.
"I think the biggest thing for me is the lack of communication from the mall. The transparency is missing. And the reason why? Why are we making it difficult for part time, hourly employees to come to work? It's a challenge to staff our stores already," Southerland said.
Denver7 also reached out to the company that owns the mall, Taubman Company, and left a voicemail, but didn't hear back.
"I think the biggest thing for me is the lack of communication from the mall. The transparency is missing," Southerland said. "It's hard to keep staff with pay scales. It's hard to keep staff with quality of life right now, so adding in an additional layer of cost to an employee just to be able to come to work is going to keep them away."
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