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Mall staff given rules on parking A couple weeks ago, I went to the Rogue Valley Mall to exchange a shirt at Meier & Frank. As it turned out, I got there about 15 minutes before the store opened, and while I waited in my car I noticed that a number of employees of the store were parking close to the building. I know they were employees because the store was not open yet (I wasn't waiting for nothing!) and they were using keys to get in. It doesn't seem right that employees can hog the best parking spots. Does the mall have a parking policy for store employees? -- Sara M., Medford You may be on to something here, Sara. Mall policy in fact restricts employees to parking areas well away from the store, but enforcement is generally left to the stores themselves. According to mall manager Jeff Barber, store employees are supposed to park beyond areas in the parking lots that are marked with yellow lines. The mall has about 3,000 parking spaces, and the yellow lines are generally located in the outside third of the various parking lots. "Outside of those lines is where we like employees to park," he said. "We tell stores that's where we need their employees to park." Barber added that individual stores are generally entrusted with enforcing the policy. More than 1,500 people work at the mall, which has only a small staff of its own (about 30, including maintenance and customer service) and no systematic way of checking for violations. "We basically keep an eye out for it," he said. "If we see frequent violations, we notify the owner of the car. People who violate it over and over, we get to know who that is." Meier & Frank store manager Cindy George was hesitant to comment. "We all know what the policy is," she said. Send your questions to "Since You Asked," Mail Tribune Newsroom, P.O. Box 1108, Medford, OR 97501; or by fax to (541) 776-4376; or by e-mail to: [email protected] Please include your name, address and phone number for verification. Today's News Index Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA