Dear Campus Community:
As we near the halfway point in the academic year, I want to call your attention to safety resources available to our community and restate our unwavering commitment to campus safety.
In addition to the 85 University Police Officers protecting and serving the campus and the City of College Park, our Student Police Auxiliary (SPA) patrols campus and the City of College Park, in addition to staffing the gatehouses at night. We have more than 400 cameras in our community that are monitored 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, including the addition of approximately 20 cameras in 2017.
This year, the University of Maryland Police Department (UMPD) completed Fair and Impartial Policing training for all sworn officers. We have offered a reward for information leading to the identification of the individual(s) responsible for recent hate bias incidents at Ellicott Dining Hall, and we continue to encourage the community to contact us when witnessing incidents of hate in our community. We also launched Safe Terp Trade Zone, a safe space for buyers and sellers to complete online transactions in person at our Police Station.
I encourage you to download the UMD Guardian Safety App if you have not already done so. This can serve as a virtual walking escort service, automatically contacting UMPD if you do not arrive at your expected destination. In addition to DOTS Nite Ride, we offer a 24/hour walking escort service upon request for on or around campus by calling 301-405-3555.
In recent years, we added an Explosives Detection K9 unit, an Information Analysis Unit for online investigative support, gunshot location detection technology, and Automated License Plate Readers. We also expanded our concurrent jurisdiction into the surrounding community to better serve and protect the University community and surrounding areas. As always, we ask that you register your cell phone with UMD alerts by visiting https://www.alert.umd.edu/
As a university, we continuously invest in enhanced safety measures, and we want each of you to be aware of the many resources working to keep our community safe.
David B. Mitchell
Chief of Police/ Director of Public Safety
University of Maryland Police Department