They are perhaps the most hated and feared group on campus. Certainly more hated than our weasel-like neighbors to the east. Surely more feared than a failed exam. They are the Department of Police and Public Safety Parking Services.

And the force of that hatred and fear is definitely felt by the parking enforcers themselves.

"Maybe half the people you see give you a dirty look or something," former parking enforcer Jon Kendall said. "Maybe one in 50 that give you a look would say something and much lower than that would approach you."

Kendall, a biological science and secondary education senior, said he was in training for parking services for about a month before he quit to start a different job.

"When I applied, I was not one of those students who hates parking, and I didn't realize that was the feeling students had for parking enforcers," he said. "It was a job and I needed a job, and that's how most enforcers see it."

Many students don't look at parking enforcers as people just doing their jobs, said Lynnette Forman, manager of parking operations.

"Believe it or not, we've had people surround a vehicle and then lift the vehicle up while the enforcer was inside," she said. "That's kind of scary."

Current parking enforcers were only willing to do an interview if they were kept anonymous or identified solely by their badge number, Forman said.

In previous years, a student enforcer who provided his name for a story received harassing e-mails and phone calls, she said.

"We've had people try to run them over — that's not even knowing who they are," Forman said. "That's the reluctance; they're apprehensive of providing their identity.

"We know they get sworn at, spit on and stuff thrown on them as it is."

Parking enforcers are accountable to the public through the court and the organization, Forman said.

Students who lose their parking ticket appeal can take it to court and the student enforcer who gave the ticket will usually appear in court to represent the organization — if the student is free or still works for parking services, Forman said.

"Really, the way an enforcer is accountable is the appeals process," she said. "If an appeals coordinator is getting complaints about a particular badge number, we would certainly address those complaints."

The parking system takes in about $2 million a year in parking violations alone, netting roughly $180,000, Forman said.

The system is self-supporting, so the money parking services takes in stays in the department, to be used for things such as computers; maintaining and renovating lots; as well as building new ramps, Forman said.

A decent chunk of that money comes from parking tickets, such as the 120,133 parking violations handed out in 2005.

The multitude of tickets have many students fired up and frustrated, including communication junior John Mark Stahl.

"It surprised me that so many other students had tickets in amounts of well over $150 a semester," said Stahl, who accumulated more than $200 in parking tickets in a semester. "I was surprised how normal that large amount of money seems to everybody. They didn't feel like they could do anything about it."

Stahl, who commuted to MSU from Lapeer last semester, said it was the parking meters that really got him.

"It's expensive," he said. "For 10 minutes, it's a quarter. You go for an hour-long class, and you're out a combo meal."

Human biology sophomore Michael Thompson said he became fed up with parking when his girlfriend received a parking ticket for parking at 5:55 p.m. at a spot that was reserved for faculty and staff from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m.

"They saw us park, and they still stopped and waited for us to get out of the car," Thompson said. "It was four or five minutes before, and they just decided to do it anyway."

Trying to decipher the complicated parking ordinances is confusing, and even legal parking is inconvenient, said Thompson, who has a parking permit in Lot 91.

"I know my girlfriend used my car, and I'm not comfortable that she has to walk half a mile in the dark back to her dorm," he said. "I don't think it's safe to park that far away."

The parking enforcers also worry about their safety.

In his one-month tenure on the force, Kendall said he was approached twice and only seriously threatened one of those times.

"The first time I was fairly certain it wasn't going to escalate," he said. "The second time, I was fairly certain it was going to escalate. The guy was trying to talk to us to get us to stay near the car until his friend got back, but we didn't wait around or anything."

There are 27 students who work as enforcers and cruise campus in six Dodge Dakotas, which are being replaced with newer, silver models, Forman said.

The students carry a radio in case they get into trouble, and the trucks are equipped with automatic windows and locks, she said.

"We've had someone come out with a crow bar and threaten a student," Forman said. "The student got into the car, rolled up the windows and locked the door, then used the radio for help."

Campus is broken up into four zones with an enforcer in each zone all day, Forman said. One vehicle is assigned solely to the Shaw Ramp, she said.

The enforcers don't have quotas, but the people at parking services know about how many tickets they should be handing out, Kendall said.

"There is never a shortage of people who are parked illegally, but they never name a number," he said.

"They have a number they know is typical — it's not like if you don't hit that number, you're fired, but they know what to expect. They know if you're just driving around in a truck or if you're actually doing your job."

It's easy to get angry with parking enforcers when you hear about students who run to their parking meters only to find someone there waiting for the time to expire, Thompson said.

"If you want to get nitpicky with the rules, I guess students aren't always following them," he said. "But just give students a little bit of leeway — they don't have money pouring out of their ears."

Kendall, who has a car on campus, said when he parks illegally, he's not surprised to find a ticket on his windshield.

"It just seemed to me most of the students who had a problem with enforcers thought the check they write to pay the fine went directly to our pockets," he said.

"There's nothing personal about it at all. We're just doing our job."