But $25 would be a bargain for Kearns and her classmates taking classes at MATC's Downtown campus.

The school, at 211 N. Carroll St., has no on-campus parking, meaning students' most reliable bet for parking is in the city's State Street Capitol lot across the street from the school. Long-term parking there costs 85 cents an hour, and Kearns estimates that since she started her associate's degree program in the fall of 2007, she's spent between $400 and $600 a semester just to park, or about the equivalent of two scholarships she's received in that time to help pay for school.

She doesn't have the option of taking classes at other MATC campuses because her degree program is only offered Downtown. And she can't take public transportation because she lives in Montello. She could park at Truax and take a Metro bus to Downtown, but she's worried the extra travel time could be a problem if she had to pick up one of her four children in an emergency.

"It's almost like taking another class," Kearns, 43, said of the cost of parking. "It creates a hardship."

Kearns said she and others in her program asked during orientation why the school hasn't tried to strike a deal with the city to get a discounted parking rate for students, and the response was they've tried, but to no avail.

Roger Price, vice president of infrastructure for MATC, said he's well aware of the problems students have parking Downtown, but he doesn't know of any recent attempts by the school to get the city to agree to a student discount.

"It's not out of line to have that discussion," he said, and as part of an ongoing facilities planning process, school officials will be talking with the city about just such issues.

Not that it would appear to do any good.

Bill Knobeloch, parking operations manager for the city's parking utility, said the agency has had a long-standing policy not to provide discounted rates to any groups making regular use of the parking garages.

"Probably a hundred different groups have approached me on exactly the same thing," he said, including many MATC students, and they all have generally good reasons for asking.

But he said the parking utility is set up to be self-sustaining and gets no taxpayer money. With the cost of building a parking garage Downtown estimated to cost about $40,000 per stall, the utility can't hand out discounts willy nilly, he said. The only exception is for carpoolers, who are able to get a modest reduction in the cost of a monthly parking pass.

Kearns sees his point and reasons that in the long run, the thousands of dollars she will have spent on parking will be worth it for the eduction she's getting. Still, she envies her Truax brethren and their comparatively cheap parking.

Send us an SOS! Is something wrong in your neighborhood, your city or Wisconsin? Send an SOS: crickert@madison.com, 608-252-6198, or P.O. Box 8058, Madison, WI 53708.