One would think that asphalt, being a cheap byproduct of the oil we extract and refine here in Alberta, shouldn't be a hard thing to obtain. Especially given the fact that the provincial government has dumped money into schools since they won the last election. One would also think that it wouldn’t be a hard thing to notice that the section of the field across from the parking lot has been unused for years, and is in perfect shape to hold more vehicles. The spot in the field is levelled, it’s elevated, and it’s perfect for pouring asphalt for a new parking lot. But due to extreme mismanagement of money, almost all students who drive are negatively affected daily. Looking into the cost of the new gender neutral bathrooms installed on the first floor of the building, I discovered that the average price spent on gender neutral bathrooms is $20,000-50,000USD ($25,000-62,000CAD) of taxpayer dollars. Let’s take a moment to apply real world statistics to our school:
An estimated 0.3% of Americans identify as transgender. If we assume the population of our school to be 2,000 people in total, and assume that the population accurately reflects real world statistics, we can calculate that a total of 6 people in our school feel that they do not belong in a normal bathroom, and feel that they needed a gender neutral bathroom. It costs roughly $1.50USD ($1.90CAD) per sq/ft of asphalt (at 2 inches thick). Given these figures, an asphalt pad sizing 200 x 100 feet (20,000 sq/ft) would cost about $38,000CAD to construct, and would have benefited the majority of teachers and students, as well as provide adequate accommodations for many years to come. Therefore, a minimum of $25,000CAD was spent on accomodations for a total of 6 people, while the need for a larger parking lot of similar value to accommodate a growing student population went completely overlooked. All of this money was spent on (what most people would call) completely unnecessary renovations for a statistically irrelevant number of people in the school. These figures also completely exclude the unknown price of the new decorative front entrance to the school, complete with a fully functional fountain (which coincidentally takes up more space in the parking lot).
To further represent the level of poor money management, the money spent per student who “needed” a gender neutral bathroom would have been anywhere from $4,166-10,333CAD. Assuming only a quarter (500 people) of the school’s over estimated (2000) population uses the parking lot, and assuming a new 100 x 200 ft parking lot would have cost a total of $38,000CAD, that equals out to a total of $76CAD spent on each theoretical student and teacher that uses the parking lot, excluding the number of other students that would be able to utilise a bigger parking lot, which would then lower the cost per student.