Public Safety is planning to set up an operation to catch potential thieves through baiting due to raised concerns over campus theft, according to Public Safety Chief Michael McNair.
He said the bait would consist of marked and traceable items that Public Safety will be watching that are easy to monitor and track. If someone takes the bait, Public Safety will arrest that person.
“We’re going to do whatever steps we need to do to protect the property of the building,” McNair said.
The University Center recently replaced the American University sign in the Mary Graydon Center made of individual letters with a simple, metallic AU logo sign due to repeated vandalism, according to University Center Director of Operations Scott Jones.
Jones said the continual theft of letters and replacement costs eventually impacted his budget, and the new sign was the best solution.
In addition to the missing letters, $7,000 worth of furniture was stolen from MGC this semester, including 10 bar stools from the Marketplace and a booth seat from the Tavern, The Eagle previously reported.
“Some people were already bringing stuff back,” McNair said. “Which is good, but it’d be nice if they didn’t take it in the first place.”
If the stolen items are not recovered, the cost of replacing the furniture will be added to student tuition costs.
Last year it cost over $2,000 just to replace the stolen letters, Jones said.
“The cost went up, and then this year the number of incidents was just skyrocketing,” he said.
Jones said every time the school would patch, paint and replace the stolen letters they would be taken again within a month or two.
Once one or two letters went missing, the rest would disappear quickly as well.
At first, administrators quickly replaced the stolen letters, but as the pattern of thievery continued, the administration started waiting until major campus events to fix the signs.
The thefts became so frequent that the manufacturer of the signs provided Jones with a template so he could have new letters installed without the company’s assistance. This decreased installation costs without necessitating a design change.
When the costs became too great, Facilities Management, University Center and University Architects decided to explore new options. Jones said that those involved with the decision preferred the look of the original sign, consisting of individual letters, but agreed that replacing it with the new metal sign was necessary.
In addition to the new sign, Jones said that the University Center is collaborating with Public Safety to devise a plan for curbing theft on campus. Methods could include increased surveillance and locking certain spaces at night, such as the Tavern and Butler Board Room.
University Center has already started locking the Tavern between the hours of midnight and 8 a.m. in an effort to change the direct path to the garage, where Jones thinks many stolen items “creep out.”
“At this point it continues to be our desire to create the University Center as a community space and an open space,” Jones said. “So it’s our goal still to have it open 24/7 even if we do have to end up locking a few spaces.”
McNair said students should not stand idly by and act like it isn’t their job.
“I think the students need to accept responsibility for this,” McNair said. “This shouldn’t be a situation where Public Safety has to lock things down and campus activities has to look around and walk through the building all the time.”
Public Safety’s main responsibility is the protection of AU students, and it is a waste of their time to have to re-direct their efforts towards preventing students from stealing furniture or letters off the wall, McNair said.
llandau@theeagleonline.com
