Measure G tightens campus security
Kiesa Jones
September 10, 2008
Filed under Administration, News, Top Stories
With the intent to serve 20,000 students at the Fairfield, Vallejo, and Vacaville campuses, Measure G was passed in 2002. What most people, students and visitors to SCC campuses alike, don’t know about Bond Measure G is that it not only opens the doors of opportunity with new state-of-the-art facilities, it also allows for new opportunities to monitor and improve security on all SCC campuses.
“Vallejo is our prototype for all things to come,” said Steve Dawson, Chief of Police at the SCC Police Department.
The Vallejo campus, which will have an all inclusive array of safety systems, including surveillance cameras, burglar and fire alarms, is almost up and running and is already being considered for enhancement.
From there, the safety needs will be assessed and further developed for the Vallejo campus to include equipping staff and faculty with access cards to enter buildings rather than keys, and wireless computers for campus police that will be able to scan cameras in an area of reported activity.
With the knowledge gained from a tried and tested system at the Vallejo campus, the campus police will prepare for a new system at the Fairfield Campus potentially by 2009 and the Vacaville campus by 2010, transforming Vallejo’s trial run into a district-wide model for all SCC campuses.
Not all precautions taken at Vallejo and Vacaville, however, will be conducted the same way as the main campus in Fairfield.
“It is the model for, possibly, the new Vacaville center to be made by 2010 because it’s similar,” said Program Director Lester Young of Kitchell, a program and construction management company here on campus that is assisting with the new security endeavors. Young is the project manager for the Fairfield campus, he calls the security plans for it the “Master Plan.”
“What the Master Plan is going to do is identify, building by building, potential problems,” Young said, thereby making it a lot easier to “identify solutions to the problems.”
Ron Richards, project manager of the Vallejo Security Project, states that while the Vallejo campus security system is nearing completion.
He also said, “The campus (security system) here remains to be seen,” in regards to the main Fairfield campus, “A security consultant has not been chosen to put together the Master Plan.”
Lester Young and Stan Dobbs, Interim Bond Director, will overview proposals for Fairfield’s new security system.
