Students call for security cameras in dorms

        ST. BONAVENTURE, N.Y. (Feb. 17)-- In the early morning hours of Jan. 18, St. Bonaventure University sophomore Jennifer Stype woke up to pounding on her room door on the fourth floor of Shay Hall.
        “It was probably around 3 a.m. and there were these guys knocking on our door. They were asking for a guy named Jamie,” said Stype, a gerontology major. “By the time Kelley looked out the door they were gone.” Kelley is Stype’s roommate.

        Ryan Harney woke up to someone knocking on her door in the middle of the night. Harney, a sophomore elementary and early childhood education major, had someone knock on and open her door last year on the third floor of Robinson Hall.
        “One night my roommate and I did forget to lock our door and a drunk girl did walk into our room,” Harney said. The girl asked for someone neither Harney nor her roommate knew. She realized she entered the wrong room and left.
        St. Bonaventure has 1,500 residents living in six dorms as well as Gardens Apartments and Townhouses. None of the buildings has security cameras. 
        The residents come and go day and night. Without cameras it’s difficult to monitor if students’ are followed through the doors.
        Robbie Chulick, a sophomore journalism and mass communication major, said he felt safe living in Doyle Hall, but believed anyone could get onto any floor of any residence hall without a key.
        “It could be as simple as someone opening up the floor door and you walking right in,” Chulick said
        Harney said that if someone waited long enough there would be a way onto every floor. People wait by the doors for someone to come by, Harney said
        “No one assumes they are there for bad reasons and will let them in without questioning,” said Harney. “Even if they do question it, they can easily lie.”
        Samantha Shaver, a sophomore accounting major, said she opened the door for people last year. She lived in Loughlen Hall. Shaver said people pounded on the floor door near her room until Shaver or her roommate gave in and opened it.
        Students prop open the entrances to the residence halls for convenience. Harney and sophomore Meaghan O’Rourke said they often see the doors to their buildings propped open.
        O’Rourke, a journalism and mass communication and French major, lived in a Gardens apartment. Her building had its back door propped open 24/7 during the fall 2010 semester, O’Rourke said.
        Harney lived in Devereux Hall this year and said she would see one of the entrances propped open at least twice per week, mostly at night, which bothered her.
        “A lot of people might not wake up if some random person got into the building,” Harney said. “No one would know until something bad happened.”
        Vito Czyz, director of the Office of Safety and Security, said he wanted to place security cameras around the exterior of the buildings to monitor the doors.
        “My goal is to get more cameras,” Czyz said.
        Chulick and Stype would like video cameras in the buildings.
        “I think it would be a great investment to have security cameras at the exterior of the buildings,” Chulick said, “just as an extra security feature.”
        Stype said she would like cameras in the stairways and aimed at the entrances.
        The Office of Safety and Security does the best it can, Czyz said. Without cameras or alarms at the building entrances, the residence halls cannot be constantly monitored to stop students from propping open the doors or letting people onto the floors.
        “The students have to take charge first,” Czyz said. “They have to apply common sense… and
  not prop doors.”