In the aftermath of the Streeter incident, Director of Residential Operations Woody Eckels addressed the Student Assembly and expressed concern over the current limited lock-up policy where outside doors are selectively locked in each residence hall.
"It surprises me and makes me a little nervous that I can walk into a building and find 30 to 50 percent of your [room] doors unlocked," Eckels told Assembly members.
At its meeting last night, the Student Assembly focused on how to improve campus security and whether to lock dormitories during before moving on to its regular business.
In regards to the Streeter incident, Eckels said the Office of Residential Life could not lock the bathrooms in Streeter residence hall because they have fire-escape access. He then surveyed members about several possible safety improvements.
Possible alternatives include a system that would provide students with separate keys -- one for the building door and one for their room. Another option would allow students to gain access to any locked dormitories with their Dash cards.
The suggestion of card-access to dormitories is proposed each year, Eckels said, but finances are a barrier to implementing the improvement and it is regularly cut from Residential Life's budget.
Exterior phones were another possibility that Eckels suggested. The phones would allow students to communicate with delivery personnel who did not have access to locked buildings, Eckels said.
Assembly members aired concerns about locking dormitories and offered suggestions about how to improve dorm safety.
Assembly member David Gates '01 was one of many Assembly members who said that, while the system would help prevent entry by potential criminals who were not affiliated with the College, it would not protect residents from other Dartmouth students.
"A lot of these crimes are probably committed by internal sources," he said.
Other Assembly members expressed concern that students would open the doors of locked dormitories for strangers who did not have keys or access cards.
Eckels said some Colleges address this problem by adding alarms that go off is a door is left open for longer than it takes for one or two people to enter the building.
After a show of hands demonstrated the Assembly was overwhelmingly in favor of locking dormitories, Eckels said he would write a proposal that dormitories be locked and bring the proposal to the Assembly before presenting it to Dean of the College Lee Pelton.
The Assembly also provided members with a list of issues it plans to address next term including adding required classes on diversity to students' course loads, requiring Assembly members to undergo a period of mandatory diversity training and working with the Dartmouth Film Society and Hopkins Center to "provide on regular basis features that deal with race relations, gender dynamics, sexuality etc."
