Many Cal High students are upset that the school switched their parking passes this year to front windshield stickers instead of using the traditional rearview mirror hanging tags.
But administrators favor the change because it saved the school more than $600 and solves some regular problems with student parking.
“It was way more cost-effective,” assistant principal Oriana Yanes said. “We ordered 400 [parking passes] so the stickers were a lot cheaper.”
The stickers provided about a 48% savings, costing the school only $708.26 for stickers compared to $1,345.65 for the hanging tags, Cal’s bookkeeper Trisa Kent said.
Not only are the stickers more cost-effective, but they also provide a solution to problems with students sharing passes or not registering their cars with the school.
“It’s annoying because now if I want to drive a different car to school, I can’t switch the parking pass and then drive that car to school,” junior Morgan Thomas said.
It is common for students to drive two cars throughout the year for a variety of reasons. The inability to move the parking pass is the main complaint among students.
“One day my car had a nail in the tire, so I couldn’t drive that car obviously,” senior Kendall Hui said.”I don’t want a ticket for driving another car because I don’t want to drive with a nail in my tire.”
Students risk being ticketed with a $35 fine if they are caught parking without the parking pass displayed.
But students have found they can occasionally switch cars without receiving a ticket.
“Our monitors are not out there ticketing everyday,” Yanes said. “So you can take a risk.”
Students who have multiple cars are worried about getting tickets now that they can’t move their pass.
“There are students who use multiple cars and so the hanging parking pass is much more convenient for that,” Principal Demetrius Ball said during a press conference with The Californian last month. “And with that we saw a lot more [hanging tags] that were lost because of [the] transition.”
With this new system, not only is there an inability to lose permits, but the school only needs to order replacements when cars are totaled or replaced. Administrators are trying to address any issues students have with the system.
“For students that have communicated, ‘Hey, I drive multiple vehicles,’” Ball said, “we have provided a second pass that can be used and stuck in another vehicle.”
Most students are unaware that they can receive multiple stickers for their assigned parking spot because that information wasn’t publicized.
Students who drive multiple vehicles to school must register them with the school because of safety concerns.
The passes allow administrators to keep track of situations that happen on school property so they act accordingly.
“A lot of times if kids are parking and they hit another car accidentally and [are] like, ‘Hey, I hit another car,’” Yanes said. “We’re able to look it up and say, let’s contact this family.”
The switch to the stickers attempt to provide a permanent solution for students’ vehicle safety on school property and ensure that administrators have the necessary information in order to carry out their regulatory duties, administrators said.
But families and students are still pushing back against the change.
“Some families may be resistant to stick something on their vehicle because how do you get it off,” Ball said.
While it is recommended that students stick it directly on their car windshield, it is not a requirement.
“I hate [the sticker] because they leave a sticky residue,” Hui said.
But there are ways to avoid the leftover sticky residue on the front windshield.
“[You can] stick it inside the Ziploc bags and tape that on there so that it doesn’t stick permanently to your vehicle,” Ball said. “There is also a suction cup thing that you can stick inside your vehicle and then slide the parking pass inside that.”
But even these solutions have also faced pushback.
“I have a convertible,” senior Thomas Casserly said. “[The ziploc bag] is going to fly away.”
Because of the backwards design of the sticker with the adhesive on the front side of it, the stickers must be stuck to something in order for it to be displayed properly, whether that is a plastic bag or directly to the windshield.
