As the fall semester draws near, parking at Troy University will look a bit different as the Troy University Police Department announced some changes that will take effect starting this fall.

The first major change is that individual parking fines have been increased.

Troy University Chief of Police George Beaudry explains why the change is happening.

“I’ll be honest,” says Beaudry. “What we saw happening last year was people felt like a $10 ticket was no big deal. So they never went and got that decal. That $10 ticket wasn’t enough to encourage that compliance.”

Basic parking violations have increased from $10 to $25 and handicap violations, blocking a dumpster or parking on grass could guarantee you a $75 ticket.

“Ultimately we hope that this increase in fines will encourage students, faculty and staff to be more adherent to the parking rules,” says Beaudry. “In essence that might give our our staff, our security officers, our parking enforcement and our police officers an opportunity to focus on other issues of security.”

Even with the increase in ticket fines the Troy University Police Department continues to keep students in mind.

The recent expansion of campus parking will no longer include commuter or residential spaces.

“We moved from a commuter lot and resident lot to basically all of those lots are now student lots,” says Beaudry. “So basically the only thing the students need to concern themselves with is not to park in our faculty and staff spots. Those are all designated with either a signage in the lot or on the curb in front of the parking spot it tells them if it’s a named spot or it does say faculty and staff. So we encourage the students to stay out of those spots.”

Beaudry also emphasizes the importance of purchasing parking decals for the year.

“These decals provide safety to students, faculty and staff by helping the police department determine who belongs on campus and who does not,” says Beaudry. “That decal on that car at two o’clock in the morning is what our patrol officers are looking for to ensure that we don’t have people on this campus that might be here to harm our students or might be here for any other sort of nefarious activity. It has absolutely everything to do with safety and security of our students, faculty and staff.”

For the full story watch Savannah’s report.