The University held a formal town hall meeting Wednesday afternoon to discuss the Campus Policing Initiative, State Bills 116 and 405, and the potential for the Department of Public Safety to become a sworn campus-based police agency, independent of the Eugene Police Department.
University Assistant Vice President for Finance and Administration Frances Dyke, Dean of Students Paul Shang and DPS Chief Doug Tripp led the meeting on Wednesday in the EMU Fir Room. The meeting opened with a brief presentation about the two pieces of enabling legislation currently being considered by the Oregon State Senate and a breakdown of current DPS operations and how these could play into a sworn agency in the future.
Tripp identified the key benefits to having a sworn police agency on campus as increased training for officers to better serve the University community, which included modernization of the existing campus police force with community values in mind. He also cited recent violent crimes on or near campus, such as last month’s shooting and armed robbery at the Franklin Boulevard Dutch Bros. Coffee location near campus.  
In his portion of the presentation, Tripp did not mention anything about the possibility that officers would be armed with firearms. However, he did bring up the topic in response to questions by audience members.
“The firearms piece is not necessarily the issue at hand here — what’s most important, to public safety at least, is the authorities and benefits of the statutory power around policing,” Tripp said.
At a UO Police Department Oversight Working Group meeting Tuesday, Tripp said he felt the University Community was focusing too much attention on the weapons issue.
“We don’t want to just become a police department because it’s cool,” he said.
The Oversight Working Group is a small group of people set up to review the best models and practices available to the University, specifically if it were allowed to form a police department, and to publish a report on the matter by April 2011.
Students and faculty were not the only attendees of the town hall meeting, as community and campus area neighborhood residents were represented as well.
Mike Westervelt of the South University Neighborhood Association said he was in support of sworn agency legislation in the event that it would enable DPS to go beyond just patrolling campus and also move into neighborhoods in and around campus as well.  
“Our concerns have been the spill-over effect of noisy students and parties, but hey, it’s a campus neighborhood so what would you expect?” Westervelt said. “It’s not just for non-students, but there are also students in those areas too.”
During the question-and-answer session of the meeting, Tripp said that whether DPS chose to patrol outside of campus would depend largely on whether the University thought this would be an appropriate use of resources.
Students are discussing the issue of a campus police force off campus, too.
At a meeting held Tuesday evening at the Lorax Manner, students discussed strategies, a possible petition campaign and possible inter-University group cooperation against a sworn and armed agency policy by the University. Attendees at this meeting included representatives from Students for Sensible Drug Policy and ASUO president Amelie Rousseau.
The prime factors behind the opposition to a sworn campus agency was the potential for firearms on campus and the perceived financial impact of such a move.
“From the information we have, we’re going to try and start a coalition of groups that are opposed to the idea,” Sam Chapman, SSDP member, said.  
Possible partnership groups discussed included the Survival Center and the American Civil Liberties Union.
Rousseau, in a statement at the beginning of the gathering, summed up her thoughts.
“We can’t trust officers to make the right decisions when handling weapons,” Rousseau said. “If EPD can’t get it right, how can DPS handle it? We just don’t know.”
According to a financial impact statement released by the Oregon University System and obtained by the Emerald last week, the cost of SB 116 on the University would be minimal. A similar report for the impact of SB 405 is not yet available, but is expected soon, said University Assistant Vice President for Administration Brian Smith last Monday.
On March 2, a “Coffee With the Chief”-style event will be held, similar to the one held last Friday. This event will be at 1 p.m. A DPS Open House at the East Station off of Walnut Street will be held on March 11 at 1 p.m.

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