OPS 101

The not-so-menacing world of Student OPS is fraught with pomposity and self-gratification. They won’t admit it, but we found someone who would.

I was more than willing to swallow my pride, sell out, and write a straight profile on A Day in the Life of an OPS Student Patrol Officer. That was, at least, until I discovered that it takes a tremendous struggle to gain factual information on the OPS program. The office refused to cooperate with me, claiming privacy of information one time, and rerouting my phone call in a complete circle the next time: front desk to dispatch to on-duty sergeant back to the front desk. And the ex-OPS girl who lives upstairs said she’d let me interview her, but then put me off the five or six times I asked if she’d answer a few questions. Now she won’t look me in the eye. Sounds like the student patrol officers are embarrassed or something, afraid to be found out for their wrongdoings and misuse of rented authority.

So this would’ve been a factual, unbiased article about the student patrol work study program, but due to OPS’s childish, self-righteous behavior that indicates that they are fully dedicated to maintaining their authoritative, self-righteous, fascistic image, I have no choice but to write another anti-Office of Public Safety slanderous rant. Lord knows those piggies will complain about being misrepresented. But if you refuse simple, fact-gathering interviews, you have no fucking recourse.

OPS’s nightly gruntwork, consisting of services ostensibly vital to the community, includes such death-defying tasks as ensuring no bikes are illegally chained to poles, making sure dorm doors are locked, and determining that no drunken frat boys are lurking in bushes. That, and to mace anyone who doubts their divinity. But rather than freeze their own asses off, the well-paid adult OPS officers stay in their nice warm vans and rely on work study drones/student patrol officers to do all the work.

It’s not that it’s dangerous work or anything. Scary or life-threatening events rarely occur during the dark nights of Eugene, save for the occasional seizure victim or attack on a pizza delivery boy. The night of a student patrol officer consists of, to paraphrase a truism, long hours of boredom punctuated by moments of terror, except without the terror. Your typical piglet has a beat to be followed each work night: check the door locks on one dorm, check the locks on two or three more dorms, then start it all over again.

However, the lock check is something you have to work up to. It’s all about seniority at OPS. Only highly-trained student patrol officers and adult employees get to do this much-coveted duty. The rookies and freshly employed don’t really have many duties at all, aside from making their presence known to dorm residents. In case of an earth-ending catastrophe, such as a set of keys lost by a drunken freshman, they’re visible and there to offer their support and cans of mace.

Okay, that’s a tad hyperbolic. Student patrol officers are not armed in the slightest. Think they’re dangerous and intimidating now? Just imagine what would happen if you gave a high-strung 19-year-old his very own firearm and told him to use it when necessary. The campus would be more littered with carcasses than Thurston High School. Adult officers may carry mace, but student patrol officers are equipped only with battery-powered flashlights. Of course, they have no power to arrest or use force. For violence or mace to be "issued," patrol officers must contact adult public safety officers or the Eugene Police Department.

It comes down to a matter of preference in security: zit-faced junior pigs drunk on pseudo-authority who suspect, arrest, and mace at will, or Dave Schwebly, a student OPS officer during Fall Term in 1995, who hilariously broke every rule of conduct for on-the-job behavior imaginable. Dave is my hero and the ultimate OPS officer. And the only one who would give me an interview, which shows he’s cool and doesn’t think he’s God because he’s a campus cop.

Dave did some pretty crazy stuff while on duty as an OPS student patrol officer. Then again, he had time to kill because he realized that not too much danger or crime happens on campus.

Most of his mischief was done out of boredom. That’s because OPS officers don’t have enough to do to fill a night. So Schwebly would kill time with a number of pursuits, including drinking and toking the sweet, sweet herb.

"One time, I was patrolling the Law Library and they were having a party for the law students. There were a couple of kegs, and I was flirting with some of the girls, showing off my ‘I’m a big man because I’m in the OPS’ biceps, and eventually they let me in. The second I got in there, I ditched my OPS uniform and radio in a corner and had five beers. And I was already a little intoxicated, since I’d already had a beer and smoked some pot that night, and so I got pretty drunk. All of a sudden, my life flashed before my eyes as I saw this girl dancing around, wearing my OPS shirt, holding my radio. Plus, while I was in there, one of the adult OPS officers walked by a window, but luckily didn’t see me."

But among Schwebly’s proudest accomplishments was his fondness for flogging the porpoise, spanking the monkey, educating little Dave, et al, in an OPS office while on duty.

This shows how OPS has evolved: employees once pleasured themselves while at work, whereas now OPS just dicks other people around.

"I masturbated on the job. Print that with my name and everything. Dave Schwebly masturbated on the job. We had an office in Westmoreland. There was a little bathroom in there, so I’d turn on my radio in case I was needed or anything, and I’d masturbate."

This is the greatest job ever. I have to respect the OPS for being so dumb they have no idea one of their patrol officers drinks on the job. Schwebly worked for OPS only for about four weeks, but still considers it one of the best jobs of his life. And he never had to put his safety on the line.

"The only really scary thing happened my first night on the job. I was still being trained and this lady started spazzing out, having a seizure, and just kept banging her head on the sidewalk." Other than chasing nutria (half beaver/half opossum) with his girlfriend, Schwebly never really had much to do as far as patrol responsibilities go. Although he admits his behavior is the exception to the rule, drinking a beer is a lot better than macing a guy for giving a girl a backrub, like a smarmy, earnest OPS officer might do.

Strangely, Dave sounds a lot better than the current batch of self-important work-study cheeseheads pretending they’re on "Cops." Dave didn’t take himself so damned seriously, and he actually had fun on the job without resorting to making life miserable for students whose only crime was walking around at night. Plus, if the job is so boring and uninteresting, why are current OPS employees so careful to avoid discussing it?

Having nice guys like Dave, laid back guys who only investigate real crimes without calling in adult cops to mace an insolent youngster, might actually make students feel a little more receptive when OPS students stop them and question their behavior. It’s not that we hate OPS...well, okay, it is, but only because they’re so pompous and self-righteous about their unimpressive role as campus cops.

The students know that campus cops aren’t special: OPS is just the place the work study program placed them. They didn’t go to some junior police academy. Through the eyes of the general populace, their work is just as meaningless and repellent as working in Carson.

For more information on becoming a proud member of the elite world of Public Safety, contact Sargeant Melissa Bartley of OPS, then proceed to Rennie's for a couple of cold ones. And for practice, start questioning every move your roommate makes--and if he gets testy, mace him and knock him to the ground.

Congratulations, you’re employable!

Brian Boone, a sophomore majoring in Journalism, is a staff writer for the Oregon Commentator.