A City Council committee approved a hike in parking permit fees and recommended the “inefficient” permit program for a performance audit.

The Finance and Management Committee on Tuesday voted to increase fees for residential and business parking permit applications and renewals, which have remained constant since the program’s inception in the 1980s. In an advisory vote, it also moved for consideration of a performance audit of the program, using data collected over the next year.

The first-time resident permit application fee would go from $25 to $35, the resident permit renewal fee from $15 to $20, and the business application fee from $75 to $85. If approved by the City Council at an Oct. 7 meeting, the increases will become effective immediately.

Those increases are considerably lower than the staff recommendation brought before the subcommittee, which would have nearly tripled the current rates, raising them to $60, $50, and $110, respectively — making Oakland’s permits more expensive than any other Bay Area city except San Francisco.

That drastic change was recommended to help cover costs for the program and account for more than two decades of cost-of-living and operating increases.

Critics say any fee increase will do little to address the matter at hand. They see a technologically anemic program that is poorly managed and unfairly penalizes residents, and a policy that is poorly enforced.

Parking division employees reportedly do not use computers to process more than 7,000 permits annually. The staff time and materials dedicated to the program will cost the city an estimated $224,101 in the current fiscal year; its revenue will be less than half that amount, according to a city staff report.

“It blows my mind that we could be that inefficient,” said District 3 Councilmember Nancy Nadel.

The parking permit program is subsidized through the General Fund. All city programs and agencies are being given a close look, as the city recently reported a deficit of approximately $50 million.

District 1 Councilmember Jane Brunner has been a vocal opponent of the increases. Her district of North Oakland will be greatly affected, with permitted areas around Rockridge BART, Children’s Hospital Oakland and College Avenue.

Brunner said she has heard clearly from her constituents that the increases are not wanted. She said the parking division should update its permit processing system and pursue revenue through stricter enforcement, which she says is not efficiently allocated.

“We need to do some homework and cut down costs internally,” Brunner said.

Before the subcommittee vote on Tuesday, three meetings were held in February to garner community input on the changes. Residents argued against the increases, and at one point threatened suit against the city.

For Jonathan Gabel, a Rockridge resident who helped organize the parking permit area in his neighborhood years ago, the idea that the residential parking permit program should pay for itself should be questioned.

“It’s not our fault we live by BART,” Gabel said. “Ideally, BART should pay for permits near its stations.”

Gabel has been monitoring the city’s enforcement, and noted that in all of 2007, not a single violation as handed out on Taft Avenue in Rockridge.

Gabel and his neighbors have complained that recently, some permit holders did not receive their requested renewals from the city. Some were served with $70 tickets as a result. Brunner’s office has put pressure on the city to void those violations.

“Their bookkeeping is terrible, the enforcement is spotty,” Gabel said. “They appear to be processing this stuff without computers. I mean, it’s time for this program to step boldly into the 1990s.”