Public safety director elaborates on new emergency response plan

Executive Director of Public Safety Paul Ominsky explained the recent policy providing sworn DPS officers with access to rifles in cases of emergency at the Undergraduate Student Government senate meeting on Sunday.

Ominsky explained to the senate that the Department of Public Safety is enhancing its emergency response plan with a new policy providing for the access to rifles in the rare case of an active shooter or someone brandishing a firearm. He explained that this new policy will allow DPS to arrive at an emergency scene more quickly because previously they would have had to contact the Princeton Police Department for access to firearms.

“Response time matters,” Ominsky said. “Even a few minutes could make a difference and save a life.”

Ominsky noted that security officers that work security booths in Firestone Library or the University Art Museum will not have access to rifles. Director of Operations Stefanie Karp noted that the 32 sworn officers who will have access to rifles all have badges and have gone through extensive training to go over policies specific to campus.

When asked how DPS will respond if they weren’t 100 percent sure that someone was actually carrying a firearm, Ominsky said that the Public Safety officers would not be responding to those suspicions and would instead contact the Princeton Police Department.

The senate also approved the appointment of Ling Ritter ’19 to the Honor Committee at this meeting.

U-Councilor and Honor Committee chair Dallas Nan ’16 said that the Honor Committee is considering updates to the Honor Committee constitution, and noted that the revisions are primarily meant to improve the transparency and readability of the document rather than make changes to its content.

“This revision is meant to be purely aesthetic,” Nan said.

He noted, for example, that any repetitive or out-of-date language was deleted and that the constitution is being broken down into subsections in order to make the knowledge more accessible.

USG president Ella Cheng ’16 said that USG will be voting on these changes in the near future.

Cheng is a former staff writer for The Daily Princetonian.

U-Councilors Naimah Hakim ’16 and Jacob Cannon ’18 presented a brief update on the first Council of the Princeton University Community meeting of the year, noting that U-Councilors attend all CPUC meetings and ask questions. U-Councilors are working to increase student attendance at these meetings through Facebook events and other formats, and Hakim noted that this social media campaign is very much in its beginning stages.

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Treasurer Hunter Dong ’17 presented the September USG budget for approval. Cheng noted that the multiple accounts that USG had used in the past to organize their budget were being consolidated into just four categories for better organization, namely office, general, social and private.

Cheng also noted that the idea for a carpooling listserv on campus was brought up at the Graduate Student Government meeting this past week. Cheng explained that the carpool listserv would allow for students who wish to hitch a ride to connect with others who have access to cars, and Nan noted that students with independent meal plans could use the carpool to get rides to go the grocery store.