Editorial: Enforcing the Law
Editorial Board
Issue date: 10/21/05 Section: Ed-Op
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With recent incidents of violence, including the brutal beating of Timothy Lynch only a few blocks from the University City Main Campus, the question returns: "Are students truly safe in the areas surrounding campus?" Over 75 percent of Drexel's student population are commuters, many of whom live near campus in the Powelton and Mantua communities. Besides unarmed surveillance provided by Drexel security and UCD Ambassadors, little is done to ensure the safety of these students.
New York City's population is about five and a half times that of Philadelphia; however, the murder rate within our own fair city is actually coming close to that of our big neighbor to the northeast. The FBI's Uniform Crime Report has crime at a nationwide 40-year low, but Philadelphia isn't reflecting that reduction. As the Philadelphia Inquirer reported Oct. 18, our own murder rate fell to a 17-year low in 2002. Now it has climbed to record-breaking levels. What can the University do to protect the student population during both good times and bad? It's been floated around in jest amongst students for years, but perhaps it's time to create a campus police department with full law enforcement powers.
The current public safety officers are privately contracted and roam campus unarmed. These individuals, however, are not sworn and have no obligation whatsoever to intervene in case of witnessing a crime. In fact, they are encouraged not to, instead only reporting the crime observed. It is not a problem with individuals in the system as much as it is a problem with the system itself. We need more. We deserve more.
With a police department on campus, students would be protected actively through patrolling, not passively through a mere presence. These officers would have gone through an accredited law enforcement training program that teaches skills to those committed officers and gives them the full force and effect of any other police officer you would see on the street. They are able to defend themselves and defend others using whatever force the situation dictates - not just picking up a radio and calling for the actual police or more security guards with two-way radios. A threat to students would not have to be processed through Public Safety and then the Philadelphia Police Department. Instead, there would be no middleman between perpetrator and law enforcement.
New York City's population is about five and a half times that of Philadelphia; however, the murder rate within our own fair city is actually coming close to that of our big neighbor to the northeast. The FBI's Uniform Crime Report has crime at a nationwide 40-year low, but Philadelphia isn't reflecting that reduction. As the Philadelphia Inquirer reported Oct. 18, our own murder rate fell to a 17-year low in 2002. Now it has climbed to record-breaking levels. What can the University do to protect the student population during both good times and bad? It's been floated around in jest amongst students for years, but perhaps it's time to create a campus police department with full law enforcement powers.
The current public safety officers are privately contracted and roam campus unarmed. These individuals, however, are not sworn and have no obligation whatsoever to intervene in case of witnessing a crime. In fact, they are encouraged not to, instead only reporting the crime observed. It is not a problem with individuals in the system as much as it is a problem with the system itself. We need more. We deserve more.
With a police department on campus, students would be protected actively through patrolling, not passively through a mere presence. These officers would have gone through an accredited law enforcement training program that teaches skills to those committed officers and gives them the full force and effect of any other police officer you would see on the street. They are able to defend themselves and defend others using whatever force the situation dictates - not just picking up a radio and calling for the actual police or more security guards with two-way radios. A threat to students would not have to be processed through Public Safety and then the Philadelphia Police Department. Instead, there would be no middleman between perpetrator and law enforcement.
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