November 10, 1994: Vol26n10: Public Safety:  on the Beat Around the Clock

By STEVE COX
Reporter Staff
When the University Council voted recently to modify UB's Public
Safety policy, allowing virtually all officers to be armed 24 hours a
day, it put the stamp of approval on a policy that is already being
followed on other SUNY campuses.
	The revised policy, which  requires approval by President
Wil-liam Greiner, will add Public Safety officers working during
daytime hours, between 7 a.m. and 6 p.m., to those who already carry
their sidearms while on patrol, explained Acting Public Safety
Director John Grela. 
	Grela points out, however, that officers assigned to the
academic spine will not carry weapons and officers assigned to
crowd-control events, such as concerts or political demonstrations,
will be unarmed.
	Public Safety Officers have been armed since 1987. The policy
implemented then, promulgated to cope with staffing cuts, allowed
officers to carry their weapons if a) it was not between the hours of
7 a.m. and 6 p.m. and b) they were patrolling alone. However, Grela
explained, virtually all patrols have been one-person patrols since
that time. 
	"Back in 1974, we had as many as 54 patrol officers," noted
Grela. "By 1986, that was down to 38."
	Grela does not expect the change in policy to result in any
meaningful change in Public Safety activity. "To my knowledge, no
Public Safety Officer has ever discharged a weapon," he said, "and
weapons have only been drawn twice or three times a year over the past
few years." 
	During daytime hours, an officer's weapon has been carried in
a lock box in the patrol car. Grela explained that part of the
rationale for making the policy change was that officers who were away
from their car on a routine call could receive a crime call and have
to return to the car to get their weapon before responding to the
call. 
	Also, the additional handling of the weapon necessitated by
inserting and removing it from the lock box and the officer's holster
increased the possibility of an accidental discharge.
	Armed with a bevy of statistics, Grela explained that, while
UB is in no worse shape than comparable SUNY institutions when it
comes to on-campus crime, he hopes the new university weapons policy
will mean an added measure of security.
	"Statistically," explained Grela, "the North and South
Campuses are safer than either of the communities they reside in." Of
course, one of those communities is the City of Buffalo. In 1991, the
latest year for which final FBI statistics were available, UB reported
15 violent crimes and 681 property crimes. By comparison, the
University Centers at Albany and Stony Brook, each of which has about
10,000 fewer students than UB, reported 17 and 9 violent crimes and
670 and 1,049 property crimes, respectively.
rela pointed out that two of
	the officers on the Public Safety force are firearms
instructors at the Erie County school for police officers and that
every Public Safety Officer is recertified on his or her weapon twice
a year.
	Responsible for both UB's campuses, with 85 buildings,
25,000-plus students and 60 miles of roadways, Grela calls his
department "lean and mean."
	 Today, Public Safety employs 40 officers, nine lieutenants,
four investigators and three support staff. There are 15 patrol cars,
six to eight of which are on patrol at any given time, said Grela.
Though smaller than many other area town police forces, he added, UB
Public Safety is usually among the 10 busiest of the 28 police forces
in Erie County.
	Last year, Public Safety responded to nearly 11,000 calls of
one sort or another. Though most were not serious, 1,714 were "crime
calls," according to Grela, because they fell into one of 72 criminal
categories tracked by the Bureau of Crime Statistics. Most of these
are robberies or assaults. Of course, these figures only reflect
crimes that occurred on the campus itself.
	One of the area's most noted criminal cases, the 1990 slaying
of UB student Linda Yalem, occurred as she jogged on a path one mile
north of the North Campus, so it is not reflected in the campus's
statistics, notes Grela. Nevertheless, the department has poured
hundreds, if not thousands, of man-hours into tracking down leads in
the case. 
	"Buffalo and Amherst P.D. continue to share information with
us, and we assist in tracking down information whenever possible,"
said Grela. Yalem's killer, who is still at large, is a suspect in as
many as eight other rapes, according to Grela.
	Jurisdictional restrictions also come into play in the
University Heights area just south of the South Campus. 
	"University Heights is located in the Buffalo P.D.'s 16th
precinct, which is always the first or second busiest in the city,"
explained Grela. "We have had talks about joint patrolling in that
area, among other issues," he said, "but it is simply not possible,
from a manpower perspective, for either of us to do anything more at
the present time."
	The rest of the 11,000 calls taken last year, according to
Grela, include nearly everything you could imagine. "Unwelcome guests,
domestic problems, noise complaints, emergency responses, even
frequent complaints about the bats in Hayes Hall," Grela shrugged. "We
are the only people around here open 24 hours. We hear it all."