Demopolis High announces free parking at home games

Friday nights in Demopolis just got a little cheaper this season. Demopolis High School has done away with the parking charge for home football games.

“To be honest with you, a couple of different things. One, we know how the economy is. We know money is tight for everybody,” Demopolis football coach and athletic director Tom Causey said of the reasons behind the change. “Two, we didn’t have enough access with people getting backed up out on the highway and they’re not getting here until 7:15, 7:20. You combine the two with money being tight right now and access to the stadium being tougher and tougher and it just made sense to do that.”

In years past, attendees have faced a $3 parking charge. Those funds have traditionally gone to help the school’s other sports. According to Causey, those sports will now be able to draw some measure of assistance from the increased ticket prices of home football games.

“The downfall is we used that money to help fund other sports. We’ve got to find a way to make that up somehow or another. So we’re going to raise gate prices by a dollar,” Causey said. “We’re going to take that money for folks who do work parking and we’ll give every dollar on a ticket sold to them. It won’t be as much money as it would have been from parking, but it will help.”

The Tigers open their home slate with an exhibition game Friday night against Sweet Water High School. Kickoff is at 7 p.m. and regular season ticket prices will be in effect.