Appealed: How to appeal a parking ticket

Parking tickets at Troy can be prevalent and costly. However, not all violations have to stick. Students have the option to appeal parking violations by going through a simple process.

A committee within the Student Government Association (SGA) can review tickets. If the committee believes that the ticket is unjustified, it will be repealed.

The first step of the appeal process is to visit Constance Flowers, assistant administrator for student involvement, in the SGA office.

“The first thing I ask is ‘When did you get the ticket’ and find out the date, as long as it is within the 72 hours they can appeal the ticket,” said Flowers.

If the ticket is eligible for appeal, the student is then given some paperwork to fill out concerning why they got the ticket. The ticket is then stapled to the paperwork and given to Flowers, who enters the appeal into the database.

There are five students appointed from the SGA to be the deciding committee behind whether or not the ticket will be nulled. These meetings are held on Thursdays at 5:00 p.m. in Trojan Center room 215.

“They sit and read the application and they make the decision on whether that student has violated the traffic rule. They make the decision on whether you have to pay the ticket or if it was voided,” said Flowers.

There are certain violations that will result in immediate fines.

“If a student parks in handicapped spot, that’s an automatic no. That’s going to be fined unless they can prove that the car has been registered with the university police, and that means that they have proof their car tag has been registered and then they have to have the handicapped placker that says you’re handicapped,” said Flowers.

“If they can’t produce that then they’re going to have an automatic fine.”

Another automatic no is if a student blocks a dumpster. This results in the student’s car being towed.

After five parking tickets, a boot is put on the vehicle’s wheel. It cost $50 to have the boot removed from the wheel.

According to Flowers, most of the time the vehicle will also be towed at the owner’s expense.

There are three open lots on the university’s campus. As long as the car has an up-to-date decal, anyone can park there.

These lots include the new arena lot, the north stadium lot and fraternity row.

Tickets are issued for parking in the wrong zone, expired decals, pulling through a parking spot and many other reasons.