My, UCSB, you’re so lazy when you’re angry.

Monday afternoon, the Chancellor’s Special Advisory Committee on Parking held an open forum for staff, faculty and students to voice their opinions and concerns over a new plan to raise the cost of day parking, and instate weekend and night fees.

Twenty people showed their faces and not one of them was a student.

You’ve bitched about the increased fees in letters, you’ve complained in the halls of Girvetz and Phelps, and you’ve debated the proposal with your friends in the streets of Isla Vista. When it came time to spread your harsh gospel to the masses, you stayed in the church and continued to preach to the choir.

While talking smack is a great start towards causing change on campus, it’s still just a start. If you care enough about the impending increase in fees, it’s important to let those making the decisions know how you feel and why. The CSACP offers open forums specifically so you, the student, can go and have your outraged voice heard.

Associated Students also failed to make an appearance at the forum, proving once again that if you want someone else to represent you, expect nothing to change. None of the members from the outgoing, nor the incoming A.S. administration, bothered to show. This doesn’t bode well for the coming year. If anyone should have been at that meeting voicing the concerns of the students, it should’ve been our A.S. representatives.

This indicates a common trend among our college community. If you’re angry over a large social justice issue such as freeing Tibet or Affirmative Action, then you need not worry about drawing a crowd of irate protesters. When it comes down to specific issues that directly affect our lives here on campus, students tend to talk big but never follow through.

Students have dropped the ball on this one for a few years, beginning with the failure to pass a moratorium. As the date of finalization draws near, the possible ways to effect any sort of fair deal for students dwindle.

But even though all the open forums are over, all hope is not lost.

The UCSB administration aims to finalize the parking plans by summer. This still leaves a small amount of time for students to be heard. If you don’t want to shell out $7 dollars during the day, and $2 for nights and weekends, then do what the staff and faculty did: bombard the CSACP and Chancellor Yang with phone calls, letters and e-mails letting them know what fury boils in your heart.

Badger your A.S. representative as well. You elected them to fight for you, make sure that they’re doing their jobs.

Otherwise, you can continue to sit around and breathe fire and brimstone until hell freezes over. You’ll just have to pay a few extra bucks to do it if you don’t feel like walking to campus.