The North Carolina
Court of Appeals issued a ruling Sept. 16 that may allow Appalachian
State University to once again keep money from parking fees.
A three-judge panel said revenues collected by universities from
parking fines could be used to fund parking at the university. This
reverses the previous decision by the Wake County Superior Court,
which said that such funds had to go to the public school system.
“We agree [with the defendants] that these payments do not
belong to the public school system,” according to the court’s
ruling.
“This is certainly a legal victory for the university,”
said University Attorney Dayton T. Cole Friday. “We depend
heavily on those revenues to help fund parking and we’ve had
a difficult time adequately doing so without them.”
The plaintiffs, representing the North Carolina School Boards Association,
have 30 days after the ruling to appeal the decision, Cole said.
“It’s important for us to recognize that the case can
still be appealed, and because of the nature of this case, I’ll
be surprised if it’s not appealed” Cole said. “It’s
not clear to me at this point how the case would end up in the N.C.
Supreme Court.”
If the ruling is successfully appealed, Cole said an escrow account
will hold the money collected from parking fines until the North
Carolina Supreme Court decides the case.
“This really hasn’t changed the situation yet, the money
is still not accessible to the university,” Vice Chancellor
for Business Affairs Jane P. Helm said.
Helm said Monday that the court ruling was the main reason behind
the recent 85 percent rise in parking fees, but that even if the
university was eventually allowed to use the money again, parking
spending needed re-evaluation.
“I think we’ll need to take a long hard look at the parking
program. Our first priority is the debt on the parking deck, then
there are some areas, like stadium lot, that are in need of major
repairs but haven’t been able to get them lately,” Helm
said.
“It is possible that parking fees could go down if we get this
money back, but they won’t go back to where they were,”
Helm said.
“The current fee was the lowest possible increase we could
do and still pay our debt,” she said.
According to the case, the problem began in 1998, when the North
Carolina School Boards Association filed a suit claiming that under
the state constitution, money collected from parking fines had to
go to the public school system.
The defendants, representing several state offices and the University
of North Carolina system, said that under another part of the constitution
allowing for the upkeep of the UNC system, parking fines could be
used to deal with the parking costs. |
