The Department of Public Safety announced Tuesday that it is finalizing a plan to operate joint patrols with DPS officers and etropolitan police.
The patrol, dubbed the “power shift,” will operate Thursday through Saturday nights in the Prospect Street area, according to Darryl Harrison, interim director of DPS.
Members of the second district police force will team up with DPS officers in the “same vehicle and footbeat,” Harrison said at Tuesday’s Advisory Neighborhood Commission meeting.
“We want to address the issue of student safety coming back from bars late at night,” he said. “Our primary concern is the safety of our students. DPS officers are trained to address these types of issues. It’s a natural progression for us to patrol the area jointly.”
This change comes in response to a request made by the Georgetown ANC at its Nov. 4 meeting to have an increased police presence in West Georgetown, according to Commissioner Michael Glick (COL ’05).
“At that meeting, there was some disappointment expressed at the Metro police for a lack of police presence in West Georgetown during the fall months, especially at Halloween and Homecoming. At the meeting we said in one loud voice that we need more eyes on our community,” Glick said.
“I’m really happy that the ANC got such a fast and coordinated response,” Commissioner Bill Starrels said. “I really hope this works.”
Kate Reynolds (COL ’03) lived on Prospect Street for both her junior and senior years, and said she finds the idea of the power shift “asinine.”
“I felt safe all of the time living on Prospect Street, and at one point we didn’t even have a lock on our door for two weeks because of our landlord,” she said. “I think they are just trying to bust people with open containers.”
Reynolds said that she thought the power shift might be useful in Burleith, however, where she said she has felt unsafe.
Georgetown resident Ray Kukulski, who has had problems with student neighbors in the past, thinks that the late-night noise and vandalism problems warrant increased patrols.
“If there were no problem, we would not need a power shift. The fact that resources are being spent on this is indicative of the fact that there is a problem, and it has not been solved. We applaud what is being done, and we hope it works out,” he said.
In another effort to better relations between students living off-campus and their neighbors, Jeanne Lord, interim associate vice president for student affairs, and Scott Minto (SFS ’02), coordinator of Off-Campus Student Life, promoted the Student Neighborhood Assistance Program (SNAP) at Tuesday’s meeting. The program allows neighbors to call in noise complaints to the university-staffed hotline in lieu of calling MPD. The program began with the hotline in 1996 before expanding to the current program in 2000.
Minto estimates that the number of calls ranges from none to at the most, 15.
When a neighbor calls the hotline, the two on-duty SNAP staff members are dispatched to the address of the disturbance.
Upon arrival, SNAP notifies the students residents that the complaint has been filed and inform them that they must fix the situation immediately. If SNAP representatives encounter resistance or hostility, they immediately call MPD.
If a second call is made to the hotline about a particular house, MPD is dispatched immediately.
If MPD arrives and issues a noise violation, the house is subject to a $300 fine.
“About 90 percent of the time, students are very appreciative when they are notified,” Minto said.
SNAP is staffed mainly by university hall directors. The hotline operates between 9 p.m. and 3 a.m. Thursday through Saturday. If a complaint is made at any other time, MPD is dispatched immediately. In all situations a report is filed by SNAP staff, and a meeting is scheduled with the occupants of the house.
Neighbors who file reports are notified of the outcome of the call by the OCSL office.
“We want students to ask themselves, `How do we take steps as a household and as neighbors to prevent this in the future?’ If there was a party going on, we want them to see how they can have parties in the future without disturbing their neighbors,” Minto said.
Not all neighbors, however, use SNAP.
Several neighbors fear retaliation from students if they call the hotline, Georgetown resident Victoria Rixey said. She also said she believes she has seen such retaliation.
Minto said that the university maintains the confidentiality of all calls.
Additionally, those who call the hotline are not required to leave their names.
But Kukulski sees SNAP as a temporary fix to a long-term problem.
“Many of our neighbors are disturbed at three in the morning, and they don’t want to get up and call someone. No one should be bothered to start with. The problem is not solved. The question
is after six whether or not students’ behavior will improve,” he said.
Glick thinks the program is a sound one.
“We need to realize as a community that we are college kids,” he said. “And we’re prone to making mistakes; working towards a better community through discussion is going to help students learn better than working through punishment.”
