Parking restrictions leads to ticketing of CVHS students

On May 15, the parking restrictions on the streets surrounding CVHS were reinforced. Construction of the solar panels is nearing its end, and some parking in the lot has reopened to the students. The county therefore removed the bagged signs on Santa Maria and Mabel avenues that had previously provided convenient parking spots for CVHS students and began fining students for parking there.

About 20 students and one substitute teacher had been fined $50 to $100 for parking on the restricted streets and in the senior lot, which is reserved for staff members only.

“I was mad, I wasn’t warned, and I didn’t know what was going on,” commented junior Sam Rai.

Starting on May 14, students were allowed to park in the junior lot, but only with a valid parking permit.

The areas between the pool, the campus, and the backside of the CFA have been restricted from the students and will be open to parking by June 14, in time for graduation.

“When one person sees someone do it, they also do it,” commented AP Matthew Steinecke. He believes that if one person parks on streets with the no parking signs, another person who sees it will assume it’s not wrong to do so.

On May 10 and 11, the school called home to warn the students of the no parking zones. Not only that, Steinecke does weekly updates of the construction on the school website to inform the students of the new parking statuses.

“It’s just so hard with so many students. I have to rely on the auto dialer and web site,” commented Steinecke. Even if every parking lot were available for students, the school would have at most 50 parking spaces missing due to the new poles of the solar panels. Therefore, the parking in the senior parking lot is reserved for staff members.

“Teachers can’t be late. By being late, they impact 150 students, but if a student is late they are the only ones affected,” commented Steinecke.