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Three-College Public Safety Collaborative Continues to Develop

The three-college (Hampshire, Mount Holyoke and Smith) Public Safety collaborative continues to move forward toward establishing fully coordinated operations.

The centralized dispatch center, located at Mount Holyoke since July 2009, is now the hub of all service, receiving calls from all three colleges, dispatching officers, and communicating with the municipal police and fire departments as needed. Dispatchers have visited all three campuses to become familiar with the physical layout and buildings of each college, and have also been trained on the alarms and security features of each institution. All patrol staff have been cross-trained on all three campuses and are working to develop closer relationships with the student, faculty, and staff of each campus.

The cross-campus training and other department efforts are helping all members of Public Safety feel more connected to each other and to the communities that the Department serves.

In addition, we have developed a new visual identity for the combined department, which includes a consistent dark blue uniform, a newly designed three-college patch, and relettered patrol vehicles (http://www.mtholyoke.edu/publicsafety/collabupdate.html). The vehicles are lettered with the words “Public Safety” on their sides and “Campus Police” on the back, clearly visible so that officers traveling between campuses can be easily and quickly identified since members of our patrol staff are also authorized to assist the local police in surrounding towns as needed (e.g., traffic, emergency lights, first aid).

Until a new director is in place, the interim Public Safety leadership team includes Barbara Arrighi as interim director, Bryan Roman as interim associate director for Mount Holyoke, and Josh Dufresne as interim lieutenant. Ray LaBarre and Scott Graham continue as associate directors for Hampshire and Smith, respectively, and Sue Dawley continues as lieutenant.

The search for a new three-campus director is well under way, and a cross-campus search committee (see members below), including staff, students, and faculty, has finished its initial review of a strong and diverse pool of candidates and has identified a short list of candidates it will pursue further. The committee expects to have two to three finalists identified to bring to campus for a comprehensive, three-campus interview process sometime in April. The search committee is committed to conducting the search in a way that provides opportunity for community input and that ensures broad campus engagement in the process. Members of the community are welcome to contact any search committee member if they have questions or suggestions.