Parking
ticket revenue assists transportation
By
Gloria Keo
Summer Forty-Niner
Contributing Writer
Andrew Loyola, a senior journalism major, was less than thrilled to find a
parking ticket on his windshield.
“I barely parked here for 10 minutes and I already have a ticket,” Loyola
said.
Loyola was parked in the restricted employee lot east of Brotman Hall. This
employee lot and other designated lots on campus are restricted to students,
even if they have a permit until after 6 p.m. The lots are available for students
to park after 6 p.m. as long as they have a clearly visible permit. Loyola
received a ticket after 6 p.m. for not having a clearly visible permit displayed.
“I guess it is my fault,” Loyola said. “I usually park on the
street, but I needed to drop something off and it was more convenient to park
here. The school probably makes so much money from ticketing students.”
According to Citation Processing Coordinator Denitra Jones, $824,691 was earned
from parking tickets between July 2004 and June 2005. The money resulted from
45,000 tickets at an average cost of about $25 per ticket.
Tom Bass, senior director of parking and transportation services, stressed
that the money goes back into providing parking-related services.
“The money goes into alternate transportation programs on campus,” Bass
said. “The revenues collected from tickets are used for shuttle services,
carpool programs and various other alternative forms of transportation.”
Matt Chavez, a junior majoring in kinesiology, rides his bike to campus everyday.
“I used to drive to campus five times a week, but parking was such a hassle
so I decided one day to bike,” Chavez said. “Why purchase a permit?”
“Students sometimes call and complain for receiving a parking ticket,” Jones
said. “It’s not that they didn’t purchase a parking permit
for the semester, it is because they did not have it visibly displayed. Every
ticket is looked upon individually and can be contested through an administrative
review appeals process.
Melissa Marghella, a junior majoring in journalism, found that, “After
I got my ticket, I went and filled out a slip disputing the ticket,” Marghella
said. “After a couple of weeks, I received a letter stating that it was
cleared. I couldn’t believe it.”
“We look at the transportation needs of the campus at the moment based
on enrollment and how many students are using the shuttle services and other
forms of alternative transportation,” Bass said. “We work on trying
to improve it for students.”
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