On Wednesday Oct. 21 there was an open forum meeting with Police Chief Ron Trepkowski.
The open forum meetings are an organized way for students to voice any possible concerns they may have about safety on campus.
This week’s open forum had only a few students attend.
“Students don’t have to wait for these open forums to voice their concerns, they can just stop by anytime,” Trepkowski said.
Students take advantage of their ability to do so, therefore lessening the attendance of the open forum meetings. However, Chief Trepkowski was more than willing to answer any questions and concerns of the students that attended.
The first matter addressed was that of the threats reported towards Campus Village. Students questioned whether there was any grounds to these threats and whether caution should be exercised.
When word of the threats reached police, they immediately began searching through social media to find the culprit. However, each thread was simply heard from one source, who heard from another source who heard from someone else.
The threats were essentially an endless social media trail with no real foundation.
Another matter that was brought up was the issue of students creating copies of Saginaw Valley student parking permits to bypass the visitor-parking permit. The police have made progress with this issue by checking whether the vehicles that are parked on campus have permits that match the registered vehicle for that student.
Chief Trepkowski’s advice to students for staying safe was “always lock your doors.”
Although Saginaw Valley State University is a relatively safe campus, students were warned against getting lulled into a false sense of security.
Many issues of safety and theft could be avoided by the simple action of students locking their doors when they enter and exit their rooms.
Although there were few attendees, the meeting was highly informative and established the willingness of the campus police to hear student concerns.
The open forums are an ongoing involvement project that University Police plan on continuing so they can better serve the students of Saginaw Valley State University.
