Students will soon shell out more money to park their wheels, but they will be able to buy semester passes online and use debit/credit cards for the machines.

Beginning this summer, the price of a semester parking permit will rise from $35 to $40, while daily passes will cost $3 instead of $2.

The fee hike was approved 4-1 by the governing board Dec. 9 over the objections of board member Tomi Van de Brooke and student trustee Christina Cannon, who does not have a vote.

Although the district’s budget crisis was cited as a reason for the increase in presentations to student leaders, 75 percent of the $5 increase in semester passes ($3.75) will go to an outside company to manage the online and debit/credit card purchases, according to a report given to the board before the vote.

The new rates were supposed to take effect this semester, but district spokesman Tim Leong said DVC still needs to “work out the bugs” before students can pay for day passes with credit or debit cards.

Citations, however, increased as of Jan. 1, with a parking ticket now costing $40 instead of $35.

In addition to providing a new service, Police Chief Charles Gibson told student leaders the parking fee increase would ease $235,000 in budget cuts to his department, which includes police aides and maintenance of campus parking lots.

But Lindsay St. Hill, president of the Associated Students of DVC, accused the district of not being completely honest about the need for this fee increase.

“I feel like they were using the budget cuts as a good time to pass it,” she said. 

St. Hill said the fee was presented as a tradeoff to laying off students police aides who patrol campus parking lots.

But according to Gibson, this was not the case. He and Vice Chancellor Kindred Murillo said the increase was prompted by the need for a more efficient way for students to buy parking passes.

“If you can register [for classes] online,” Murillo said, “why can’t you buy a parking pass online?”

Although some new revenue would go toward parking maintenance and paying student aides, Murillo said these were “secondary” to online parking permits. 

Cannon, the district student trustee, declined to be interviewed by the Inquirer, but district board member Van de Brooke said  she made a “compelling case for not raising fees we have control over” at the Dec. 9 meeting.

“We should be looking at more creative options,” Van de Brooke said. 

Cannon presented the board with several ideas, such as increasing fees only for “priority parking” or charging faculty and staff to park.

Chancellor Helen Benjamin said Cannon’s suggestions are receiving attention, although she said some may be … hard to implement.”

Governing board President Sheila Grilli called the parking fee increase “minimal.”

“If a student owns a car and buys insurance and gas,” she said, “he can surely pay to park it.” 

Contact Oksana Yurovsky at [email protected]