Editorial

Dangerous Moves

Like it or not, commissioned DPS officers are right around the corner, literally and figuratively. What this means for everyone no one knows for sure, but chances are it won't be good.

Earlier this month, UO President Dave Frohnmayer signed into policy a directive authorizing the Department of Public Safety (DPS) to commission a half-dozen officers to stop and search persons on campus and to cite them for a limited number of applicable infractions. Despite the warnings of the Oregon Commentator and without regard for the concerns of many students, the issue was treated as a strictly administrative matter, and a rather clandestine one at that. Neither the Student Senate, University Senate nor the Faculty Advisory Council was consulted prior to the decision. Questions were raised at the Associated Students Presidential Advisory Council, but Frohnmayer had little to say on the matter. At the time of this writing, the Office of Communications has released no statement on the matter and (thus) the Oregon Daily Emerald has not reported on this development.

What will this bold new era in campus security bring? No one yet knows for sure. On Friday, January 13, DPS Director Tom Fitzpatrick met with student leaders to discuss - or rather, placate, as some feel - the state of DPS.

While a new issue to most students, Tom Fitzpatrick (and VP for Administration Dan Williams, in a November OC interview) explained that the commissioning of DPS officers has been a topic of discussion for some time. In 1996, Williams and former DPS head Cary Drayton collaborated on the legislation that made commissioning possible. Since then, Western Oregon and Portland State have both seized the opportunity; the UO has been a little more restrained, and with good reason.

Eugene is a relatively safe place to attend school. In terms of violent crime, in 1999 PSU recorded 4 aggravated assaults to the UO's 3, and 5 sex offenses to zero on the UO campus. While the student body of each is roughly equal in size, UO students are concentrated around the campus more than are those at the urban PSU. Officers in downtown Portland might have something to worry about; those in suburban Eugene do not. Of course, Fitzpatrick is no close follower of statistics, arguing that "statistics are only as good as yesterday's news," or rather, the UO's declining crime rate does not preclude a dangerous situation from occurring. While this is true, such cases are rare.

Though Fitzpatrick emphatically states that DPS' target is persons not affiliated with the university that may pose a threat to those who are, another glance at the crime statistics indicates where those commissioned powers are most likely to be deployed.

As everyone - particularly the Eugene city council and police department - knows, this is a college town with its fair share of drug and alcohol consumption. On campus alone, DPS recorded 24 drug and 70 alcohol violations in 1999 - in both cases, nearly 100 less than those recorded for 1997. For the same year, PSU recorded merely eight drug violations and a lonely one alcohol violation. Regardless of who commissioning is meant to focus on, is there any question who actually will be affected?

Will DPS officers stand in the parking lot behind the Bean Complex to check the backpacks of residents? Do they have any reason not to?

Another issue that stands out now that commissioning is all but here is one more frightening to the average student: the potential arming of campus security officers.

As Fitzpatrick is wont to point out, Oregon is the only state in the union that does not allow armed campus security guards, and despite the efforts of the Portland State-based lobby Officers at Risk, he believes the status quo will remain. Officers at Risk has failed thus far to successfully argue its case to the Oregon State Board of Higher Education, the governing board of Oregon public universities.

One would hope that he is right. The trend indicates otherwise, and Oregon has had experiences with armed campus security officers in the past.

Security officers at Oregon Health Sciences University once carried firearms, until a 1979 incident in which officers accosted a university administrator who had the misfortune to be on the premises after hours. Since then, no public university in Oregon has allowed any officers to carry firearms, but it is not impossible: because now that DPS has stop and search authority, what is to stop someone from opening fire on an officer before he is able to disarm a suspect? The chances of such an occurrence are low, but so are the chances of DPS officers searching more non-students than students.

Fitzpatrick claims that the stop and search authority will allow officers to disarm a suspect and detain them until the Eugene Police Department arrives - often a much longer period than DPS would like to admit.

The logic of commissioning a department whose own administrator admits has had at best a shaky track record is questionable, but even more dubious is the assertion that commissioning will protect officers. Nobody put it better than the late, great Eazy-E when he posed the question, "Without a gun and a badge, what do ya got? A sucka in a uniform waitin' to get shot."

Suppose DPS confronts a shady character on campus and in the process of patting him (or her, to be fair) down, said person pulls their gun out before DPS can secure it. You don't need the good folks of NWA to tell you that when you stop and search a person against their will, you'd better have the weaponry to make good on the confrontation. A baton and pepper spray might be sufficient to take down your average hippie, but what about the amphetamine case behaving more like a pit bull than a human being?

Is there any argument that greater policing authority requires a more deadly weapon? Certainly the Oregon Commentator does not advocate the arming of DPS officers; quite the contrary, Frohnmayer should rethink his decision to commission DPS. But if Tom Fitzpatrick is content to send out his officers without preparing them to enforce the laws they are now charged with enforcing, then the Department of Public Safety may be in for worse - and more deadly - problems than before.