A Hill Country university conducted its first safety walk late last month since before the COVID-19 pandemic began.
According to Austin NBC affiliate KXAN, students and staff at Texas State University in San Marcos identified what they considered problem areas on the 507-acre campus in an effort to address safety.
Dan Costello, the school’s associate vice president for facilities, explained to the station that up to 40 people were divided into six teams that examined six designated zones for problems.
Student Dustin Wroten pointed out that most safety concerns present themselves after the sun goes down.
“At night time, there’s a lot of dark spots on campus,” Wroten told KXAN.
He referenced one campus parking garage as infrastructure in much need of lighting.
“It’s dark, you know, people trying to get to their cars,” Wroten said.
According to the station, the safety walk yielded 130 observations, with lighting comprising most of the concerns.
“Poor lighting and trees blocking lights, that was the lead finding,” Costello said, KXAN reported.
He added that repairs have begun.
The university plans to hold another safety walk in the spring semester, per the station.
According to Texas State’s 2022 Annual Security & Fire Safety Report, on-campus burglaries declined from 41 in 2019 to 26 last year while aggravated assault cases have doubled within the same time span.
Citing the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), the Best Colleges website reported that college campuses nationwide have experienced a general decline in crime rates in the past 20 years.
Burglary, vehicle theft and forcible sex offenses account for most criminal offenses at schools, per Best Colleges.