Students of DVC are parking for free in residential areas and residents of Pleasant Hill are not happy about this.
Parking in the student parking lots require a student to have a parking decal or parking permit displayed on their vehicle. However, some students have tried to avoid purchasing one and have been parking in all of the neighborhoods surrounding the campus.
Chrisanne Knox, DVC’s director of marketing and communications, has stated that there are a couple of issues going on. Though there are a number of courteous students that have been legally parking in the streets, the real problem is with students that are parking illegally, blocking driveways, playing loud music, shouting and doing other disruptive behavior.
“We do not condone any of this behavior, and are very sympathetic to neighbors who may have experienced this kind of disruption on their streets,” Knox said.
It seems that there are numerous reasons for students parking in the streets. One reason for students parking in the street is that it is free in comparison with DVC’s parking lots. Other students have chosen street parking because they prefer to find a spot that is close to their next class. A majority of these students are usually students who are running late to their next class and do not want to drive to the overflow parking lot and find a spot.
This problem is not new, but this year residents have become more vocal and have asked that the city of Pleasant Hill get involved. Residents are hoping that DVC takes responsibility for this and Peter Garcia, the president of DVC, has been meeting with them regularly to discuss this issue.
“The college and the city agree that we need to quantify the problem, but we don’t have numbers to share about how many students are parking in the neighborhoods at this time,” Garcia stated. “The reasons that some students choose street parking is for a more convenient parking spot nearest to class. But we assume that ‘free parking’ is the primary reason.”
DVC’s administration has stated they are doing everything they can even though there is limited capacity to stop the problem altogether. Even when the students are behaving badly, the police do not have the legal jurisdiction to respond to their actions because the students are not on DVC property.
Currently, there is a “Good Neighbor” campaign at the college and students are being informed over Facebook, Twitter and email about the neighborhood complaints. President Garcia is now attending city meetings and engaging in the discussion about what can be done. DVC will continue to explore any ideas and have been working with the County Connection Transit system and with the associated students.
