In an ongoing effort to demand increased wages for Department of Public Safety officers, [students rallied in Red Square and delivered a second petition to university officials Friday afternoon](https://www.thehoya.com/news/students-rally-dps/).

About 30 protesters circled together under a steady downpour of rain, chanting, “What do we want? Fair pay! When do we want it? Now!”

A coalition of student leaders organized the event in response to the recent increase in bias-related incidents on and near campus. Organizers hope that a wage increase will attract more candidates to the DPS roster, thereby increasing the number of officers and helping to deter people from committing crimes in the future.

Speakers at the rally said the university was not living up to its Jesuit ideals, arguing that the university pays DPS officers too low a wage to maintain a safe community. According to the speakers, DPS officers are the lowest-paid campus police officers in Washington, D.C.

Rally organizer Chessa Gross (SFS ’10) emphasized that a DPS wage increase is just one step in addressing the problem of hate crimes on campus.

“It’s also about changing the culture of Georgetown,” Gross said. “It has a lot to do with changing the culture of intolerance.”

Gross also said that increased student outreach and more actions promoting diversity and pride must be combined with an increased security presence in order to decrease bias-related incidents.

Fifteen minutes into the rally, protesters marched to Healy Hall and delivered petitions to University President John J. DeGioia and Senior Vice President Spiros Dimolitsas.

“DPS is chronically understaffed . [and] safety systems are frequently unable to provide sufficient services,” the petitions stated.

The chants did not subside as protesters climbed the staircase of Healy Hall, or when bystanders urged them to respect the classes that were in session at the time of the rally.

Erik Smulson, DeGioia’s chief of staff, met protesters to receive the letter on behalf of the university’s president. LaMarr Billups, assistant vice president for business policy planning, received the letter on behalf of Dimolitsas.

For Jheanelle Brown (SFS ’10), an ally of the protesters and president of the Georgetown chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the event’s focus was to provide DPS the resources and compensation necessary to reduce the rate of bias-related incidents on campus.

“As students of color, we take our safety very seriously,” Brown said. “We’ve had negative experiences in terms of being scared for safety being a minority on campus, especially women. Safety is a very serious thing because people are bigoted and hateful.”

At the end of October, 28 bias-related incidents had been reported during the 2009 calendar year. There have been five bias-related incidents reported so far in November. In 2008, a total of 17 incidents were reported, according to statistics from DPS. Of those in 2008, four were considered hate crimes that warranted further DPS investigation. To date, three such crimes have been reported for 2009.

University officials could not be reached for comment on the rally. “