Parking permits created some tension when they went on sale later than usual this year, and in turn, some students chose to dodge the fees and fines, feeling as if the cost was too high and unnecessary.

However, according to Principal Tom Mead, state requirements for regional schools make the fees necessary in offsetting transportation, and he explained that the majority of parking fees and fines are allocated for that.

“For regional schools, we are required by the state to provide, free of charge, transportation to school,” Mead said.

This state requirement is based on the idea that “Students would have to travel a great distance, and their parents would have to bring their children to school if there was no bus,” Mead said.

The $100 per semester parking fees generate money for bus transportation, along with other things.

Assistant Principal Michelle Tontodonato stated that permit fees also help fund “maintenance, upkeep, and safety enhancements for parking lots and driveways.”

“Twenty two snowstorms, that’s what we budget for,” Mead said.

Assistant Principal Mel Laughton is responsible for enforcing parking permits, as administrator for the upper school office.

“This year we gave a full extra two weeks for students to buy parking permits, and yet we still had close to a hundred people who continued to drive without permits, and they still continue to drive,” Laughton said.

Fines starting at $10, and increasing over time, were given to anyone who drove to school past the permit deadline, and many received detention because of their decision to drive without a permit.

Tontodonato feels that fees are reasonable due to the transportation that is provided.

“All students have the option of taking the bus,” she said.

In an attempt to dodge the parking fees, senior Kareem Boura has been parking for almost three months at Scribbles, a business next to the back entrance of the school.

“Parking there has a lot of benefits. It’s a short walk in the morning, and I save on gas, time, and money,”Boura said.

According to Laughton, there are no possible punishments for students doing what Boura does.  “If students choose to park someplace else, my hope is that they aren’t parking someplace where they aren’t supposed to be. Their car might get towed,” Laughton said.