Parking at Norriego Point now costs $5 an hour. It used to be a flat $20 for four hours. The Destin City Council made the change after many visitors said their stays were shorter than four hours and asked for an hourly rate, according to Get The Coast. WEAR reported that the new rate took effect in late September. Destin residents with a city decal still park free.
If you stay two hours, you now pay $10 instead of $20. If you stay four, the cost is the same as before. The bigger change is where the meter money goes. Norriego Point's parking revenue is now set to help pay for the roughly four-acre state park parcel next door. Whether a Fort Walton Beach or Shalimar household eventually parks free at Destin's city lots depends on a lease Tallahassee had not signed as of late September.
Who Pays at the Meter Today
The hourly rate sits inside Destin Park & Play, the paid parking system the city launched on March 1, 2026, with LAZ Parking. You pay by scanning a QR code or sending a text, and you don't need to download an app, according to the City of Destin's announcement. Here are the rates the city published when the system launched:
- Beach Parking District: $20 for four hours
- Harbor Parking District: $15 per day
- Joe's Bayou Boat Launch: $25 launch fee, now collected through the same LAZ system
- Destin residents with a parking decal: free in city-managed areas
Norriego Point has since moved to the $5 hourly rate. The resident pass is free, but only households inside Destin's city limits qualify. You need a driver's license and vehicle registration, and each household can get up to two passes. You can pick one up at City Hall or the Destin Community Center, or register on the city's website.
That city-limit rule decides who pays today. A household on the Fort Walton Beach side of the bridge pays the same $5 an hour as a weekend visitor. So does a household in Shalimar. The September deal between the city and the county was supposed to change that.
The Deal Made in Shalimar
On September 16, the Destin City Council and the Okaloosa County Board of County Commissioners met at the county's administrative complex in Shalimar. It was the second formal conflict resolution meeting in a months-long dispute over who should manage the state-owned parcel on Holiday Isle, Get The Coast reported.
The parking terms got broader as the meeting went on. Destin's first offer, approved July 6, gave county residents free parking at the city's Gulf-front parks, including Norriego Point. Commissioner Drew Palmer, the county's liaison on the property, said he would vote against anything short of citywide free parking for county residents. The final version went further than the July offer. The council voted 5-2 to give all Okaloosa County residents free parking at every city-owned lot and park, including lots built in the future, with no time limit. The commission then voted 5-0 to send the state a letter supporting Destin as the leaseholder, manager, operator and developer of the parcel.
That promise is conditional. Destin offered free county-resident parking only if the city gains management of the property. As of September 28, how that free parking would actually work was still being worked out between the city and the county.
The Steps Still Between Here and Free Parking
Six days after the Shalimar meeting, Brad Richardson emailed Destin's city attorney with a list of questions. Richardson is chief of the Bureau of Public Land Administration in the Florida Department of Environmental Protection's Division of State Lands. Get The Coast reported that he wrote the arrangement "will be a direct lease between the Board of Trustees and the City of Destin." Even so, Get The Coast's September 28 report made clear that no lease had been signed. The Board of Trustees is the governor and Cabinet. That board originally named Okaloosa County as the property's manager, and changing that designation requires state approval. A Florida Attorney General's opinion issued September 21 reached the same conclusion: a county can't hand off its management role to a city without the state agency's approval.
City Attorney Kim Kopp called the council's answers to the state preliminary. "I wanted everybody to know this is the very beginning, not the end of the discussions at all," she said, according to Get The Coast. Based on that reporting, here is what has to happen before anything changes on the ground:
- The state reviews the city's responses, which Kopp planned to send the Thursday after the meeting.
- A lease is signed. After that, the state would also need to assign the sovereign submerged lands lease to the city.
- The city asks to rezone the parcel from residential to conservation right away. City Manager Larry Jones estimated that would take three to four months with the state's permission, including public hearings.
- Within a year of a signed lease, the city submits a final management plan with engineering drawings to the state's Acquisition and Restoration Council.
Councilman Kevin Schmidt told residents that signs, hours and staffing would be decided in public meetings over the coming year.
What the Meter Money Would Build
The city engineer drew the concept plan sent to the state. It includes three shade structures on the East Pass side, beach volleyball courts, an extension of the Norriego Point boardwalk, parking, and the existing docks. Kopp said the site would have "no commercial marina, no commercial T-shirts, shops, no food vending." The plan adds 54 parking spaces on about one paved acre and leaves the other three acres as they are. An earlier playground was dropped and more volleyball courts were added.
Council members added more to the plan. Councilman John Stephens won approval for vertical oyster gardens, a monofilament recycling program, a dinghy dock at a finger dock near the seawall, and a kayak launch and pickup area. Schmidt's motion added access for the water taxi service that already operates in the area. Councilwoman Sandy Trammell also won approval for a real-time sign at U.S. Highway 98 and Gulf Shore Drive showing how many spaces are open at the park.
The docks would be mainly day-use, with a proposed $5 hourly fee for public transient slips. That's the same rate the council just set for parking. Kopp said the dock rate isn't final. In its response to the state, the city argued that letting people park boats at the docks would ease pressure on Gulf Shore Drive and mean less of the parcel gets paved.
The city engineer estimates the improvements at $3 million to $4 million, including a retrofit of the docks. A March resolution committed up to $5 million. The money would come from grants and state appropriations, with the parking fund as a backstop. Jones said that fund holds about $3 million. The staff report lists $4 million available through an amendment to the 2027 budget.
Why the Fund Matters to Everyone Else Who Parks
The council argued over how far the parking fund should stretch. Schmidt warned against the fund becoming "the piggy bank for Norriego Point Beach Park." Councilman Chatham Morgan's substitute motion passed. It limits the new use of the fund to the state park property and keeps it away from Joe's Bayou and the beachfront parks in Crystal Beach, Get The Coast reported. "I want to keep the parking fund for parking with this exception to get this park done," Morgan said.
The city expects the new park to make money, too. Its response to the state projects about $820,000 a year in parking revenue, after sales tax and processing fees, from the 54 new spaces and the transient slips. Jones said the real figure would likely land "somewhere between the half million and million dollar range." Finance Director Krystal Strickland told the council, according to Get The Coast:
"We're going to be basically doubling the income from parking fees by adding the extra 54 spaces and the extra 49 dock slips."
The plan relies on two things at once. It counts on paid parking and dock fees to fund the park. It also promises free parking at those same city lots to every county resident. As of September 28, the agreement didn't say how those two pieces fit together. Get The Coast's September 28 report is the latest one available, and it shows no lease signed and no system in place for county-resident free parking. Until that changes, the resident decal works the same way it has since Destin Park & Play launched on March 1, keeping parking free for Destin households. Everyone else pays the $5 hourly rate the council approved for Norriego Point in September.
Olivia A Wolff Pllc follows decisions like this one for clients choosing between Destin and other parts of Okaloosa County. Details like who gets a free resident parking pass come up in those conversations. If you'd like help understanding how city-limit perks and costs compare between communities, Let's Connect.
This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.
