The University of Tampa has warned students about the possibility of boots (immobilization devices) being put on their vehicles since the last academic school year. This year, however, is the first that these boots have been utilized.
On the school’s website it is stated that “anyone violating the University’s parking policies may have their vehicle ticketed, booted, towed, or impounded by the property owners, the City of Tampa and/or the University.” All students can access vehicle registration and parking regulations from the school’s website: http://www.ut.edu.
Kevin Howell, the head of the security department on campus, said the boots have been implemented “for the convenience and safety of the student.” To have a car towed is costly, with prices starting at $150, plus mileage. The cost for removing a boot is $50. “I would rather have students deal with the parking issues they are being booted for on campus rather than send them to an unknown part of the city to retrieve their car,” Howell said.
The campus security office has utilized the boots twice this academic year. “The two students we did use the device on said they understood and had no issue with the application,” Howell said.
In order to get students to follow parking regulations on campus, Howell felt the boots were necessary. “It was my recommendation to implement the use of the devices,” he said.
The security office has an operating budget for each academic year. Howell said that paying for the boots, as with any purchase by the security office, comes from the operating budget.
Tiera Forsyth, a junior at UT, agrees that boots are a step forward in making following parking regulations more convenient for students, however she said it’s not an all-in-one solution. She said she would prefer to pay to have a boot removed rather than having to go out of her way to an impound. “Putting boots on the cars is more convenient for us, but more parking and more convenient parking is what we ultimately need,” she said.
Sarah McKean, another junior on campus at UT, is on board with Forsyth. She thinks the boots are a good alternative to towing cars off campus, “because most of my friends on campus don’t have cars, I would have no way to get my car,” she said.
However, like Forsyth, McKean does not believe boots on cars are a all-in-one solution. McKean thinks that if the university had better parking, less regulations would be broken and as a result less parking tickets and boots would be administered. “I think we need better parking in general,” she said. “It’s okay to use [boots] to reinforce parking regulations on campus, but the lack of parking is the real issue.”