SIUE graduate threatens to sue over parking ticket |
Sheri Mc Whirter |
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SIUE graduate Catie Stricker will take the university to small claims court unless a questionable parking ticket is waived and her diploma sent to her. Stricker sent a certified letter last week to Robert Vanzo, director of Administrative Services, to tell him that if the university continues to insist she owes $15 for ticket F21464, she will seek her solution in court. "Disputed tickets are best handled in the appeals process," Vanzo said. "But if she bought the parking sticker, the fines are her responsibility." The process of appealing a parking ticket at SIUE begins with paying the fine. The dispute is then considered by a member of the Parking and Traffic Committee. A further appeal may be made to an appeals subcommittee. An identical certified letter was sent to Carolyn Turner, manager of Campus Parking. Despite attempts to reach her by phone, Turner was unavailable for comment Monday. Jim Howell and Stricker, who are engaged to be married, graduated in May, both with unpaid parking tickets that held up their diplomas. Howell has since paid his bill and received his diploma. Stricker paid what she thought was her bill in early November but later received another bill for an additional $15 ticket. "If the ticket existed since May, why wasn't it on the bill I paid at the Bursar's office in November?" Stricker said this weekend. According to the bill Stricker received after paying off her balance, the ticket was issued May 24 in Lot F on Howell's truck. In November Stricker pointed out to Parking Services employee Kelly Meyers that Howell's truck has a sticker for that lot. According to Stricker, Meyers rechecked her computer and then said the ticket was for Lot C instead. When Stricker asked why she was being billed for her fiancˇ's ticket, Meyers reportedly said she bought both Howell's and her own parking stickers from Parking Services and thus was liable for all tickets on both vehicles. Stricker noted, however, she was only billed for this ticket, the only one to appear since Howell received his diploma in the mail. In early December, Stricker received a letter from Carol Kaufman in Parking Services that said the ticket was for Lot C after all. "I refuse to pay this ticket," Stricker said. "We haven't parked on campus since we graduated (May 5). The ticket was for Lot F and now it's Lot C. Something's not right here." Howell said in an earlier interview that he also believes something's wrong. "I think the only reason Parking Services is billing Catie is because I've already received my diploma and they can't do anything to me," Howell said. "Besides, I never parked in Lot C and I have a sticker for Lot F, so none of this makes any sense." Stricker is refusing to budge, even for a $15 parking ticket. "It's the principle," Stricker said. "How many others have they done this to? If they want my money that badly, they'll have to take it from me in court." Vanzo said that it's her prerogative to take the case to court, but he doesn't think it will do her much good because "the legal system wants you to exhaust all internal methods of solving a problem before seeking external involvement." In this case, that would mean appealing the ticket through SIUE procedures. | |