This past fall, the Student Government Association spearheaded the annual Campus Safety Walk, which involves University leaders and students reviewing the campus.
Representatives from the Facilities Management Department, Police and Public Safety Department, Campus Safety and Security Committee, Office of Academic Affairs, Division of Student Affairs, Dean of Students Office, along with student volunteers, explored and identified specific and detailed safety concerns and recommendations for each of six zones. Key recommendations included the repair of building and pathway lighting and malfunctioning blue lights (emergency phones), repainting crosswalks, trimming shrubbery and fixing/replacing sidewalks/pathways.
“The SGA safety walk provides an avenue for students to have a voice in campus safety recommendations and allows the university to appropriately fund solutions to identified problems on campus,” said Jesh Humphrey, chair of the Campus Safety and Security Committee and associate general counsel in the Office of Legal Affairs. “UNC Charlotte has always been ahead of the curve in having a safety walk, and through the efforts of UNC Charlotte SGA leaders Steven Serio and Conor Dugan, this year's walk was particularly organized and productive.”
Results from the walk were released recently and presented to the Campus Safety and Security Committee.
As part of this year’s walk, participants sought out new measures that could be taken to enhance campus safety. These included additional outdoor lighting around various buildings and construction sites, more blue lights in newer parts of campus, extra handicap accessibility, the installation of better-lit sidewalks leading to Greek Village and other off-campus apartments, traffic light replacements for four-way stops and an examination of the time of day that campus lights automatically turn on.
“The 2012 Safety Walk was an absolute success, thanks to an amazing amount of support and participation from students, faculty and the administration,” said SGA’s Conor Dugan. “Steven (Serio) and I presented our findings to the chancellor and his staff, and we are very excited about how much attention and how many resources the chancellor has directed toward this effort. Many issues have already been addressed, and we expect most to be completely resolved before the end of the semester.”
Throughout his tenure, Chancellor Dubois has made campus safety a priority. Under his guidance, UNC Charlotte has put measures into place to make the campus and the surrounding area safer utilizing the latest technology and safety techniques, Humphrey stated. This commitment to providing a safe and secure campus has helped make UNC Charlotte a leader within the UNC system regarding campus safety.
According to Humphrey, the UNC Association of Student Governments recently passed a resolution commending the efforts of the schools like UNC Charlotte that conduct safety walks; it encourages other UNC campuses to follow suit.