In my neck of the woods is the University of South Florida Police Department (USFPD), located on a sprawling campus in Tampa. Its jurisdiction bordered mine when I was patrolling the streets on midnight shift. Meeting car-to-car with USF campus cops on the daily helped swap information and intelligence pertaining to what is brewing in the area. It is not surprising to know that too many folks sharing an environment whereupon expanding horizons is the objective often results in know-it-all types who feel their every word is somehow golden.
Indeed, there are some super-smart people attending college and university enclaves across this wondrously free nation of ours. But not everyone uses that noggin when poop hits the fan, getting a sudden case of oatmeal-brain when the ordinary morphs to extraordinary…when a component of the American dream becomes a blood-curdling scream, when even anti-police types crave to see the cops pronto.
To those cop-blockers, no hard feelings; campus cops got your back. They took that oath and meant it.
I worked with some of the USF campus police officers depicted in the following video, a production recognizing National Campus Safety Awareness Month and student safety in general. In fact, I worked under current USF police Chief Chris Daniel when he was a lieutenant coordinating extra duty details for the many concerts, graduations and athletic events held on the massive grounds of USF. When the USF police cadre of 80 sworn officers need additional law enforcement staff and support to handle wieldy crowds aggregated for myriad campus events, they would reach out to neighboring police agencies. My department was one of those which routinely worked alongside USF campus police and their full-service cop shop.
https://youtu.be/MiTTRxRgUTw
The University of South Florida, a state-funded public university, boasts an educational hub “serving more than 50,000 students” supported by “an annual budget of $1.7 billion,” according to the USF website. That budget also compensates 16,208 faculty and staff. That’s a lot of heads for which the USF cops are responsible. It also gives insight as to how large the campus is. As stated in the video, like any other law enforcement entity, police personnel could always use a helping hand from citizens, especially since they operate on a vast terrain upon which throngs of folks flow on the daily.
Besides police training and a keen sense of one’s jurisdiction, cops suggest self-defense precautions are implemented with the aid of any among a wide variety of products on the market. For example, positivepromotions.com offers a range of “products [to] help you educate members of your college community to identify dangerous situations and behavior, prevent sexual assault, and provide tools and information to keep them safe.” Like souvenirs from cops to safety-conscious individuals, whether they be students, faculty or campus visitors.
Although National Campus Safety Awareness Month was officially recognized in September 2018, every school day is when students, faculty, staff, visitors and campus cops ought to maintain vigilance for intruders from the outside environment who seek to capitalize on opportunities presented by unsuspecting would-be-victims. Not too many years ago, USF’s campus was an entirely unfenced city-sized plot of land upon which anyone could simply traipse and carry out nefarious deeds. Today, it is almost entirely steel-fenced with emblems of its mascot, the bull, portraying a fusion of pride/security.
USF is a mere microcosm of public safety institutions deployed on college and university properties all across America.
Per definitions and data provided by the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), “Campus law enforcement officers patrol colleges and universities, providing a quicker response time to incidents on campus than local police, and offer campus-specific services not necessarily available from local policing organizations. Campus police forces can be comprised of sworn police officers, non-sworn security officers, or both.” Well before I was a sworn cop in Florida, I served as a security officer with the Duke University Police Department. Albeit limited in scope/authority (zero powers of arrest and prohibitions against contact with suspects of any kind), security personnel on college campuses are proverbial extra ears and eyes, in radio contact with police communications, summoning sworn law enforcers when deemed necessary. Sworn and non-sworn public safety hubs is a distributed use of services meeting multi-layered mission objectives.
Of the minimal records/sources containing law enforcement stats, the most-recent specifics regarding campus police entities was found in a 2015 BJS publication, covering 2011-2012. Marginally, the variables have not likely altered much as colleges/universities are relatively abundant and groundbreaking ceremonies ushering in new campuses are highly unusual, so we can confidently go with these numbers.
Generally, the United States boasts roughly 18,500 law enforcement agencies comprising federal, state, county and municipal cops employed by federal, state, county, city, campus, tribal, railroad, wildlife, agricultural, and aviation police departments. As I wrote in the past, there are all kinds of police departments operating in America.
Back to campus police departments. A Campus Law Enforcement Agencies survey conducted by the BJS in 2011-2012 came up with 1,309 private and public college/university police departments serving student populations ranging between 2,500 and 15,000-plus. What stands out is that every public university (state-owned) has its own full-service law enforcement agency. Technically, that factor means that each and every state-funded public university police officer has statewide jurisdiction. However, I can tell you from experience working with USF cops (co-opted duty working special events) that the campus police administrations generally confine their officers’ broad-ranging enforcement authority and powers to the campus and immediate vicinity. There is plenty going on and enough to go around without feeling the impulse to work traffic enforcement on any one of Florida’s sandy beaches. Well, I sense more than one valid argument against that, but let’s just move along.
Although it is reported that many college/university law enforcement agencies employ the typical units and have the proper equipment ordinarily found among large municipal counterparts, in the event some campus enforcement facet was lacking, campus police entities have pre-established memorandum of understandings (MOUs) with surrounding law enforcement agencies who cater needs and fill voids. Campus cops hosting a carnival or similar outdoor event and wishing to have mounted horse patrols among their arsenal? They simply dial up the larger municipal cop shops who usually have a complete assemblage of special units, to include police horses for unique terrain patrol as well as PR.
Some colleges/universities disband fully-operational campus police forces and opt for security personnel to patrol the grounds. When I studied criminology at the University of Tampa (UT), we had a sworn/armed police force outfitted to do the job. After a change in university administration (president and some deans) coupled with the county sheriff deciding he no longer wished to endorse police certifications of UT cops —citing liability concerns he felt taxpayers should not have to bear— our very own campus cop shop was closed. (I often wondered how such a change would impact student enrollments, as parents certainly want the knowledge and assurance of a super-safe campus for their kids to learn/thrive.)
So what happened with the UT example? A compromise, of sorts. Neighboring Tampa Police Department cops assumed responsibility (since UT is in their jurisdiction, located in the heart of downtown Tampa) and provide services only when situations warrant (incidents requiring sworn cops). Steady public-safety indoctrination is instituted by UT safety officers—uniformed civilians without powers of arrest.
Despite our UT example reflecting a rare case of a full-swing university without bona fide police presence on a full-time basis, most colleges and universities do have bragging rights when it comes to a cop shop responding to incidents between patrols and offering lectures on safety. As you saw in the video above, USF campus police even have a marine unit which patrols the waterways lapping the shores of campus-owned properties availed to students for outdoor engagement. That, too, is rife with perils, thus safety measures are taught by USF police officers working the waves.
I know of no college campus with a police force which does not have the back of its student body and its faculty. Today was Campus Safety Day, and the USF police professionals who ensure safety for a large populace on campus showcased their wares as well as those of neighboring Tampa Bay law enforcement agencies participating in the event. For students everywhere, much of your anticipated education will come from professors while doctrines of how to react to extraordinary circumstances will arrive from trained personnel wearing police patches and a firearm for punctuation.
