Parking policies need to be rewritten to suit needs of limited parking

Parking is a rare commodity on most higher education campuses and College of Eastern Utah’s campus is following suit in this area.
Office James Prettyman called a meeting of employees on Tuesday to redefine the campus parking policies. “We have come to a point that we need to update our policies … for instance on policy number six which states ‘no reserved parking spaces are provided, except in the case of the residential life halls and for individuals with disabilities.'”
We have six reserved stalls for cosmetology patrons, and in the CEU policy and procedure manual, we say that no department can have a reserved parking space, explained Prettyman.
Under the areas of parking by permits only, the policy states that parking permits are required in the following residence hall parking lots: Sessions, Tucker, Burtenshaw, and the new Aaron Jones Hall. “We no longer issue permits in residence halls,” he said.
The general parking violation category has the wrong ticket prices printed. Reserved for individuals with disabilities has been raised from $25 to $50; red zones and fire lanes fines are $25, blocking in area designated as “No Parking”, parking in a loading zone, parking on a sidewalk, failure to obey a traffic control device and no permit when one is required are listed as a $5 violation and have been raised to $10, and the taking two parking stalls fine has increased from $7.50 to $10.
If we are going to provide cosmetology parking for its patrons or any other group, then it needs to be in the policy, he explained. Right now it says there is no reserved parking on campus. There is no list that says there is parking for cosmetology patrons so really, legally, it does not exist.
Former campus chief of police Phyl Johnson, explained that the reason parking permits were issued to dorm students is because a few years ago they would complain that they would go downtown to buy a pizza and come back to no place to park their vehicles. “So we did have parking permits for dorm students. Thus, those policies should be stricken from the policy.”
Prettyman’s main goal is create a policy that blankets the campus. He does not want to try to enforce two different policies. “My concern is that this policy needs to be rewritten.
“As far as areas for parking by permit only, we need to list these as a separate policy. We need to recognize them in the parking policy.
“We need to decide as a parking committee so that I know what to do when issuing a citation. It’s really easy for me to issue a ticket for parking in a red zone. It is blatantly clear and listed in our policy. It’s easy for me to give a citation for reserved parking if they do not have a permit hanging in their window and parking on sidewalks. That’s blatantly clear.
“But there are some things that are fuzzy to everyone and we need to address those problems. Here’s an issue that has been brought up in the past. There are certain faculty and staff members that feel they are entitled to have a parking spot. They think because they work here they should not have to pay to work here and they are entitled to a parking spot. I don’t make the rules, I’m only going to make some suggestions to the rules.
“If we are designating parking for people, then let them pay for it. There should be a sum of money that goes directly in the parking budget and then we can purchase the sign and post and they can have their own designated parking and I will enforce it. I will impound the vehicle that parks in their spot.
“But we don’t even have an impound policy. So all I can do is idly threaten people that I am going to impound their cars if they do not abide by our parking policy. Which, if it is not blatantly obvious right now, this parking policy is a joke and it needs to be revised. We need to have a parking committee who will revise it to give me something to work with when it comes to parking on this campus,” he said.
Kate Alleman, said the U of U charges if you want to have a parking permit. If you want to park closer to campus, let’s charge for a parking permit. If that means that the Health and Wellness Center pays whatever the fee within reason is to have a parking place closer to our back door, then when we have an emergency that we can be there immediately. I’ll whole heartily support it because we need to have that ability when we have emergencies come in.
We have a public safety issue on campus which takes us to the interior: parking, driving, etc. It was my understanding that we put the new ADA reserved parking stalls on the north side of the Reeves Building next to the two new cosmetology stalls. So we have two reserved and two ADA. The ADA standards forced CEU to have a cutout in the sidewalk to allow vehicles to drive over the sidewalks.
Russ Goodrich is trying to fence off the Career Center which will not allow anyone to park anywhere near the compound of Career Center. No one, not even instructors can park in that area. That is a pubic safety issue, and risk management issue here on campus.
It gives me heartburn that the mail persons cannot take and cart the mail to the door. It is their requirement that we give them access to the door to unload the mail. We have not had any complaints of near misses with the mail truck, but we have had multiple complaints of near misses with personal vehicles of faculty and staff mainly. Anytime you start driving vehicles on the interior of campus on sidewalks it is dangerous, these are not city streets, these are sidewalks. And the only vehicles that should be inside at this interior campus are maintenance and emergency vehicles. That’s it. Unless it’s a delivery to be made and the only door is, like the back of the BDAC. Speaking of the back of the BDAC, it’s not a parking spot, it’s a fire lane.
Prettyman questioned the parking on the east side of the old SAC. He wants no interior parking on campus, but will live by an updated parking policy.,
“I will do anything that is in writing that is forcible. All I need is a parking committee to get together and give him something to work with. The monies and the fines will go into the parking budget to replace signs, paint and pay people to go out and issue citations,” he said.
Susan Polster said she would like a 10-minute loading/unloading zone for people who want to pick up their mail in the SAC. “There is no place to park for anyone who wants to just pick up their mail during the class hours where the Reeves parking lot is always full. People park in cosmetology parking because they only need a place to park for a few minutes.
“Also the cosmetology signs are confusing because no where on the sign does it say that it is a ticket-able offense to park in those stalls. We need to communicate to the CEU community that they will receive a $10 ticket if caught parking there. Most people do not know that until they get a ticket.”
Bill Osborn suggested that CEU investigate placing a meter in a spot for those 10-minute zones. Therefore someone would not have to monitor people’s parking privileges.
Johnson said he proposed parking meters to past administrations and was pretty much shot down. However, he suggested that maybe we could turn the area in front of the BDAC as private paid parking lot with a metal controlling arm that is monitored by a student-employee during the hours of 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Fire lanes were discussed when Alleman asked how ambulances where supposed to travel to the Health and Wellness Center in an emergency? Prettyman suggested that we need to decide what areas are fire lanes and keep those areas open. He does not think anyone has any real understanding of this issue and that is what this committee needs to decide. That is why he does not want any parking on the center of this campus.
He does not want the two cosmetology stalls and three ADA stalls east of the SAC that force people to get to them by driving on sidewalks. It’s a public safety and risk management issue.
Polster brought up the fact that she is willing to make sure a parking policy is written, but if it keeps students from parking close to buildings, then the campus lighting must always work so students never have to walk in the dark anywhere on campus at night. No one should say, because of construction, these lights are out. No lights should ever be out for any significant amount of time on campus, she said.
Prettyman discussed the red zone painted in the circle in front of the child development center in the CBB. He suggested that it probably should be painted yellow. Phil Brown explained that a lot of mothers park there temporarily to walk their children into the day care center and he feels that is a courtesy to this clientele. He wants the state fire marshall to visit campus to address the safety issues and fire zones.
Another problem is parking behind the theatre. “We need to address that issue and how we are going to enforce parking on the interior of campus,” Prettyman said.
Lastly he brought up the fact that cosmetology has six spots for their patron parking.
“There are other areas on campus who say, we want six spots for our patrons. Every paying student comes to this campus is a patron. When we have areas like that and we call them patron parking, we need to be careful on how we approach this. This is basically a buy off for everyone. We’re trying to sell everyone this product and we want people to buy off on this. This should be considered when we are trying to reserve parking for specific areas.”
He wants people to know that students always come first and faculty and staff are second. He still wants a parking committee to be established to rewrite the aging policy and address its problems. I just want something I can enforce.