A story of two hills – Ithaca week

Chloe Sachs, student of ITHACA College, does the work to stay safe on the campus. The resident of Terrasse 8 said that she and her roommate keep her door blocked to prevent burglaries, a feeling that was not shared by everyone in her building.

A student in the building had stolen a Playstation 5 from his dormitory in January of this year, according to the Public security protocol Posted in the College newspaper The Ithacan.

Security does not look the same for everyone in Ihaka. Factors such as the responsibility of the police or the status of the students can affect security. The First step If you protect yourself and your belongings while living in dormitories on the ITHACA College campus (IC), keep your door blocked, officials and administrators say.

“Not everyone locks their doors because [Terrace 8] Is so far away from everything that people say: “Oh, people won't get all the way here to steal my things because you have to go up the hill all the way”, but that's not always true, “said Sachs.

Security of Reslife and Student

Although keeping the door for the person behind them is a common courtesy in society, this does not contain for dormitories, say security lawyers. Melissa Stough of the Upper Terrace Residence Director (RD) encourages the students to protect themselves by restricting whom they let them into the dormitory.

“It's nice to let people in, right?” Said Stough. “If you 'Oh, I forgot my ID cards', but how can you really trust you to actually live there?”

“The residents could be frustrated by me because I won't let them go into the building,” added Stough. “As if I would leave the building and they will” wait, wait, hold the door “and I actually like no, I can't. I don't know. I don't know if you actually live here.”

Safety responsibility of IC

This feeling is shared by the Ithaca College Office of Public Safety and Emergency Management (OPS). OPS is the only law enforcement department for students on campus that employs completely deputy officials.

The deputy ops boss Thomas Dunn said that the IC students are protected by a “multi-layered” security approach, which also includes their deputy civil servants, residential assistants (RAS), RDS and the Auxiliary Safety Patrol.

In addition to these security efforts, the college creates the annual report for security and fire protection report (ASFSR). This document is required by the Clery Act to promote the safety of campus through transparency, community warnings, support for victims and prevention education.

Elyse NEPA is the deputy director of Clery Act and prevention education. It called the ASFSR an “incredible resource” for everyone in the Ithaca College community to keep it Even with vital information on the campus: “I don't think that almost as many people read it as they should,” she said.

According to Dunn and NEPA, OPS works hand in hand with other IC departments to build up his reputation on campus and become a trustworthy resource for students.

“A big one [the Clery Act] is really associated with the structure of trust and building relationships, “said NEPA.

One of the most critical relationships is to employees of ITHACA College, including RAS and RDS, to the employees of housing life.

Ty Anderson is one of two RAS in Terrace 2 apartment houses. He says that the relationship between Reslife and OPS is powered by a common goal.

“It is an active relationship because we both watch in the same area of ​​the care of people who live on campus,” said Anderson.

A plague on both hills

A activated door let a burglar to the Jackson Andrews apartment to Cornell University. This intruder stolen a backpack, notebooks, car bruises, airpods, wallet and an Xbox from Andrews' Collegetown Andrews.

Although Andrews was able to track its stolen objects through the GPS in his Airpods to a residential building, the police did not make any arrests because the GPS could not identify the exact apartment within the building. “I lost a value of around $ 1,000 and was a little angry that it no longer made efforts [by the Ithaca Police Department]”, Said Andrews.

Thomas J. Kelly, head of the IThaca Police Department (IPD), said that these types of studies have been driven by many factors. He added that Andrew's backpack in “a number of apartments” in the building that was identified by the GPS could have been and that the difficulty is associated with which signal the signal contains.

The IPD was for more than understaffed two years. It concerns 55 officers Instead of a fully occupied 80-officer department, Kelly said.

“We have free positions, we are actively recruiting. We have a new test in May and then we have another test in September,” said Kelly. “It is a challenge, it requires some creativity.”

These vacancies force existing civil servants to do overtime and take additional duties and layers in order to take into account the pedigree.

“We focus primarily on the answer and not on prevention,” he said, “unfortunately we cannot meet all of these inquiries.”

Public security for students can look different, depending on whether they live on campus or outside of the campus: “I have lived on the Cornell campus in recent years, which is generally very safe and is moved to Now Collegetown, which is definitely significantly less safe,” said Andrews.

Crime reporting and transparency

Transparency is praised In the IPD, but the department stopped the publication of its previous weekly crime bloter, a record of crime in a city that is often kept by the police authority or the local government. Crime bloters are registered by OPS, the Cornell Police Department and the Ops of the Ithaca College The IthacanIPD for the only major organization for public security in Ithaca that does not publish this information. As early as 2022, the IPD replaced its community crime reports with the community board.

While the Clery Act obliges to obtain university institutions that receive federal funds in order to report campus crime data, this does not apply to the police authority. No law in Ithaca requires publication of an incident protocol for public access. However, some citizens and observers have the publication Problem recorded With the new system.

Colin Drane, the CEO of Spotcrime, an independent criminal police website, criticized the replacement dashboard wrote on x.

The Ithacan occurs

The IthacanHas reported its crime bloter for the community since 1996. The deputy news editor Julian Delucia believes that the weekly protocols of public security calm the students and make the IC campus safer: “It helps to keep people up to date,” he said, “especially when it comes to certain topics.”

The Ithacan is an important campus organization with which OPS has a strong relationship. Ops will send The Ithacan The information you use for the minutes directly in weekly e -mails to Delucia: “The small considerations we make to support our students and our community are really important,” said NEPA.

“Because it is helpful for us as a college student [crime reports] From our schools I do not see why this would not be helpful for people in the city center, especially if they live right next to a building that is actually a breeding ground for criminal activities, ”said Andrews.

Although there were no arrests in the case of Andrews, he takes precautions and says that he bought surveillance cameras after the break -in and searches for: “We have not had since the winter break between semesters [burglary] Attempts … at all. We used to have them 2 to 3 times a week, ”he added.

Students and faculties of IC can take a deep breath [in Ithaca] Feel that your feeling of security is in danger. How can we support people and bring people together? ” Nepa said.

“It's really [all] About security, ”she said.