A tiny March election is looming large for Manitou Springs, where a court-mandated vote will decide who gets to run two of the city’s busy downtown parking lots.

The unique circumstances behind the election — and what it might mean for parking in the town with a crowded summer tourist season — are not easily comprehended. The mail-in ballot for just under 200 residents asks voters to decide whether to dissolve a special district that owns the Wichita and Smischny parking lots, a combination of 124 parking spaces.

“I feel like there’s way more here that I just don’t know,” said downtown Manitou Springs resident Karen Benewith.

The election is the product of a legal dispute that has played out in El Paso County District Court over the past year. The city of Manitou Springs is seeking to dissolve the Manitou Springs Metropolitan District, a quasi-governmental entity that was created in 1989 to manage parking for the city’s downtown area.

The city wants to bring the district’s assets under its own parking enterprise, arguing the merger would streamline parking management. The district resisted, saying in court filings that its existence was still necessary to protect the interests of its downtown constituents. The matter went to court, since a municipality cannot unilaterally dissolve a metropolitan district.

In December, the court ordered an election among the residents who live in the district’s boundaries, a small subset of the city’s overall population. Voters would receive the city’s proposed dissolution plan.

Both the city and the district have since been making their case to people who live, work and park downtown.

Last month, the Manitou Springs City Council approved a conditional resolution creating a new Downtown Benefit Parking Program, which would allow residents and employees to apply for parking permits. The resolution would also extend progressive parking fees downtown by one more hour before the rate goes up.

The resolution’s changes take effect only if voters approve the district dissolution, however. Manitou Springs Mayor Natalie Johnson said a permit program would cost about $250,000 to create — money the city would pull from acquiring the district’s assets.

“We are very quick to say that parking downtown can be better,” she said.

Shemi Shlomo, metro district chair, said he felt the resolution was a “bribe” to downtown residents who experience parking frustrations.

“Whether this is a yes or no, the city of Manitou Springs should find a solution for these people,” he said.

On the district’s side, “No 5A” signs have been going up in many downtown businesses. One of them is Osburn Gift Shop, a jewelry shop that has been open on Manitou Avenue since the end of World War II. Owner Linda Reed said the dispute was “complicated,” but she ultimately did not trust the city to look after the interests of small business owners.

“The whole parking situation has been a nightmare for so many years,” she said.

Not all are happy with the district’s management of downtown lots. Manitou Springs resident Cheyene Grow is the registered agent for a committee that is pro-dissolution. He said he disliked how the district went about since-abandoned plans for a parking garage and felt the city would be more transparent about its parking management decisions.

“I’d just rather see that whatever happens with this property happens with public input,” he said.

Johnson said the upside to dissolution would be the inclusion of the Wichita and Smischny lots in an upcoming $1.4 million grant program to assess the city’s parking and mobility needs.

“We can seamlessly connect everything,” she said.

Mail-in ballots in the special election must be received by a deadline of March 3.