Off-campus speeders, on-campus issues concern NGCSU police
From Dahlonega Nugget
Published on: April 1, 2009
By Matt Aiken
DAHLONEGA - It's not always easy being a campus cop.
Sometimes the badge and blue uniform aren't enough to convince the public that North Georgia College & State University police officers are the real deal.
Just ask Officer James Wright.
"I think the locals still think we're confined to the imaginary walls around the campus," he says while sitting in the department's on-campus headquarters. "One incident just now, the person wouldn't give [an officer] his license and said 'You're campus police. I don't have to give you anything.'"
Director of Public Safety Mike Stapleton lets out a knowing chuckle when he hears this.
"We've grown from campus security at least," he says. "Now they call us campus police."
In actuality, the department is composed of 11 sworn-in state certified police officers. The group has a working partnership with the Lumpkin County Sheriff's Office, and recently helped solve a local convenience store break-in.
"It's probably one of the closest working relationships I know of between the police department and sheriff's office," says Stapleton.
The actual jurisdiction of the NGCSU police extends five hundred yards from any piece of property owned by the university. It's an area that comes close to covering the whole of downtown Dahlonega and is ever-growing with the school's recent purchases of the downtown BB&T building and the leasing of Cleve's Crossing town-homes on Morrison Moore Parkway.
There are the off-campus sites as well, such as Pine Valley recreation area on Highway 9 and the new tennis courts at the Yahoola Creek Park complex. Even Camp Wahsega 4-H camp falls under their watch.
"It's kind of a moving target," says Stapleton. "They say, 'Draw us a map [of our coverage area]' and we say 'For this week?'"
Currently NGCSU officials are planning to add a new dorm and a parking deck to the area next to the Health and Natural Science Building. This looming addition, says Stapleton, will render the stretch along West Main Street into a pedestrian-heavy hotspot.
As a result, his department will soon be stepping up enforcement against downtown speeders.
"We need to bring the speed down where the pedestrians are," he says.
Once officials receive approval from the Georgia Department of Transportation the roads surrounding NGCSU campus will be subject to frequent speed checks and radar enforcement.
Stapleton is quick to add that his department will receive no money from the tickets they write however. Instead those funds will go to the City of Dahlonega.
"I'd really rather them slow down and us not have to do the tickets," he says.
Stapleton said the NGCSU police department has undergone a transition in community relations over the past few years.
"Our mission has shifted some from guarding the fort to working with the community," says Stapleton. "When I first got here we had fences up and we pulled the gates closed at night. [NGCSU President] Dr. Potter pulled those down. He didn't like that."
On-campus a few recent changes in policy may be helping to dissolve an us-versus-them attitude among the student population as well.
For example, underage drinkers with a blood alcohol level of less than .08 don't automatically go to jail.
"We standardized our policy with the sheriff's office on how to handle underage drinking," he says. "There is an opportunity to take a ticket and go home."
Relations improved more than ever last year when the officers stopped writing parking tickets. Now the job is handled by a pair of citizen enforcers.
"I'm telling you. It's been great ," says Stapleton. "As far as community relations it's done leaps and bounds."
"We're no longer the parking Nazis," adds Wright.
This has reportedly made the student body more apt to approach campus police with bigger issues, such as domestic problems and sexual assaults.
"It's getting better," says Wright. "We have a lot of people that we feel are happy coming to us. They feel more like it's an open door and they're comfortable."
From www.thedahloneganugget.com/articles/2009/04/01/news/06%20campuscops.txt
