Meter fees doubled as DOTS looks to balance out budget

For hundreds of motorists across the campus, the clock is ticking - but it's starting to sound more like a cash register.

For the second time in a year, the Department of Transportation Services has raised parking meter fees. As of July 1, on-campus meters charge $2 an hour, up from an hourly charge of 75 cents only a year ago. Parking garages now cost customers $3 per hour, a 50-percent increase from last year's $2-per-hour price tag.

The increases are meant to counter losses from the Friendly Ticket Program, which automatically waives tickets for first time offenders and cost DOTS $350,000 in the 2008 fiscal year.

The program was created with the purpose of making the campus more welcoming to visitors and approved on the condition that the lost revenue wouldn't be recouped by ramping up parking or general fees.

But meters were left out of the agreement, and now the new fees are leaving some drivers perturbed.

Eileen Findlay lives in Washington and comes to campus five days a week to pick up and drop off her two children at separate day camps held near the Eppley Recreation Center.

"That's an awful lot of money for a public university," Findlay said. "[Even] one dollar an hour seems like a lot - it's crazy that it would double past that. I'm not here for too long, but for people who are actually using the facilities it's crazy."

Jeff Mazique, who was also picking up his son from a summer camp, said it was all a question of perspective.

"There's no right answer - I could say 'yeah that's awful,' but that's not the whole story," Mazique said. "If the money's paying for strippers for the administration, then yeah that's awful. But if it's a case of 'Hey, pay the extra dollar or we're going to fire the janitor,' then I'm going to pay."

The first hike in several years came in July 2008, when DOTS ramped up meter prices from 75 cents to $1 per hour; now the prices have doubled.

The new rates don't compare well to its peer institutions, either: The University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill charges $1.25 per hour. The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign charges 75 cents per hour at its meters. Even the University of Maryland Baltimore County charges only $1 per hour. City meters charge 75 cents an hour.

DOTS Director David Allen said the meter hike wasn't designed to just make money. He pointed out that parking permit prices were frozen this year for the first time in 20 years.

The department doesn't receive any state or federal funding - it fuels its entire $21 million annual budget through revenue gleaned from meters, garages, event parking and permit sales.

"It's not supply and demand - we would charge a lot more," Allen said. "It's not about how many people want permits or where the spot is, we just set our fees based on our expenses."

Because of the increased costs, Allen said DOTS is anticipating a 25-percent decrease in parking meter use - so, despite doubling meter prices, DOTS will only see a 50-percent increase in meter revenue.

While former Student Government Association President Andrew Friedson vehemently opposed increases in student fees to fund the Friendly Ticket Program in the past, this year's SGA President Steve Glickman called the hike a necessary evil.

"With everything that's happening financially with the university, prices had to go up somewhere," Glickman said. "There's a give and take for everything."

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