“Why is the UC Santa Cruz transit fee higher than other UC fees?”
“Is there any work towards newer buses?”
“Where is our money going?”
These were the sorts of questions students asked Transportation and Parking Services (TAPS) at the third TAPS Town Hall on May 23. This time around, TAPS administrators attended in person — marking the event as the first of its kind.
Hosted in the College Nine/John R. Lewis College Multipurpose Room, the Student Union Assembly (SUA) organized the event for students to express their feelings about TAPS and offer feedback on their transportation experience at the university. The event also gave TAPS administrators a platform to inform students about their work to improve services through a presentation and Q&A.
“Being able to come to town halls with all these different organizations [means letting] TAPS know that students want to make sure that [TAPS] takes accountability,” said Fatima Ramos, a student at the event. “[We want to make] sure that they’re not trying to cover things up and they’re not neglecting students, that we are being heard.”
About 50 students, community members and administrators attended the event, including the executive director of TAPS, Dan Henderson; associate vice chancellor of risk and safety, Clement Stokes; vice chancellor for finance, operations, and administration, Ed Reiskin; and director of building utility & fleet services, Marc Douvia.
Students have been advocating for transparency from TAPS not only out of concern for their safety, but also their money, following the loop bus crash in December 2023, which resulted in the tragic death of bus driver Dan Stevenson.
California Highway Patrol’s subsequent investigation of the crash and UCSC Fleet Services found many campus loop buses to be an “imminent danger to public safety.” UCSC students pay the most out of any other UC, with the next most expensive being UC Berkeley, where students pay $210 a year in student fees.
“We pay $522 [a year in student fees]. That’s a lot of money, so we wanna be able to utilize that entire $522 as best as possible,” said the secretary of the SUA AdHoc Committee for Transportation, Matthew Morimoto. “Students’ first concern is about classes and their education. That’s the reason why they come into college, not to worry about transportation.”
How TAPS is Using Your Student Fees
TAPS is responsible for parking and transportation operations throughout the university such as selling parking permits, enforcing parking rules and operating loop buses. These operations are funded by student fees, and the revenue from parking permits and citations.
Out of a budget of nearly $10 million, TAPS is estimated to have generated nearly $8 million in revenue from student fees alone in 2025, according to a calculation conducted by the Student Union Governance Board (SUGB). These fees fund a variety of campus transit operations, ranging from the loop buses, the Disability Van Service, to the Safe Ride program.
Despite the large budget, students at the town hall expressed disappointment, recounting their experiences with loop bus delays and parking ticket prices, which increased in 2023.
“Parking permits cost over $500. That’s a pretty hefty sum, and even after you buy a permit, you’re not always guaranteed a spot,” said SUGB chair Megan Amiya. “[Increasing the parking tickets from $50 to $75] is a band-aid solution rather than addressing the underlying issues that students cannot get to their classes because buses aren’t reliable enough.”
TAPS executive director Dan Henderson presents the unit’s projected 2025 budget to town hall attendees.
According to information presented by Henderson, TAPS has purchased 16 new buses since summer of 2023 as part of their plan to entirely get rid of the 1993 model loop buses — the same model that crashed two Decembers ago. Four of the new buses are the 2007 model, and the other 12 are the 2010 model. So far, the replacements they have bought and put on the road are 14-17 years newer. Henderson announced during the event that TAPS is in the process of obtaining two brand-new EV powered buses by winter 2026.
Outside of the bus situation, students asked about the possibility of building more parking spaces to accommodate the increasing number of students attending the university, especially since over half of the student population lives off campus. In response, Henderson claimed that TAPS is “actively working with multiple sectors on campus to increase parking, I do believe some [parking spaces will be made available] in the short term.”
“Parking structures are a multi-million dollar construction project and can cost $100,000 per space,” Henderson said. “Because TAPS uses central funding, we use that money to pay for parking, and to that end, new parking garage structures would be funded by parking fees.”
Henderson also laid out plans to implement more 10-20 minute parking spots throughout campus. This came after spots such as the Quarry Lot were taken away by TAPS last quarter, and SUGB stepped in.
“We asked TAPS to return the FREE 10-20 minute parking spot in the Student Union area. [The request was] declined because students were said to ‘abuse parking spaces,’” a slide from the SUGB presentation read.
Henderson directed motor-vehicle related questions — the majority of which pertained to the bus crash — toward Marc Douvia, the director of building utility & fleet services. Fleet Services is in charge of servicing vehicles and other equipment on campus. Henderson proceeded to outline what TAPS is and is not responsible for.
A slide from the presentation read:
TAPS is NOT directly responsible for:
- Vehicle Maintenance/Repairs
- Roads
- Signals/crosswalks
- Sustainability
- Campus Safety
Breaking Bureaucratic Barriers: Communication and TAPS Moving Forward
In an effort to bridge the gap between TAPS and the student-body, SUGB worked to propose Measure 82, which passed on May 28. The passing of this measure will establish a group to work with TAPS called Voices for Empowerment and Safety in Transportation (VEST), which will be made of faculty, students, and a representative chosen by TAPS drivers.
Near the end of the open Q&A portion of the town hall, one student expressed a desire for TAPS administration to meet in-person with students on a quarterly basis. Associate vice chancellor of risk and safety Stokes verbally agreed to the proposal.
According to the SUA vice president of student life and SUA president-elect Rigo Ventura, TAPS did not initially agree to attend Town Hall in-person. In preparation for the event, students on the AdHoc Committee for Transportation regularly met with the TAPS team to discuss presentations and plans.
Students address Dan Henderson in a public comment.
“I was perplexed at the fact that by our fourth meeting, [TAPS] was telling us all that they would want out of a town hall and still like, ‘We don’t know if we’re going to go yet,’” Ventura said. “I had to be like, ‘You’re not a collaborator anymore, you’re a guest. We’re in charge of this event.’”
Despite difficulties in getting faculty to agree to this event, Ed Reiskin expressed that the administration is ready to take on these issues with open ears.
“We’re committed to getting real actionable about what the issues are and what we can work to do to address them,” Reiskin said in an Interview with City on a Hill Press. “[Quarterly meetings are] not the only way. There’s lots of different ways. But if it’s a way that works for students, we’re here.”
Fatima Ramos, a student at the event, further expressed her thoughts on Stokes’ agreement to quarterly town halls.
“This is the bare minimum of what we’re looking for. We’re taking actual steps and [TAPS is] saying that they’re going to commit to things that they talked about in this Town Hall. Hopefully they will,” she said. “Either way, students will keep fighting and will keep trying.”
Additional reporting by Caly Plowman.
