Public Safety Advisory Committee Annual Report 2022-2023

A. Mission 

The purpose of the University Public Safety Advisory Committee (PSAC) is to act as an advisory body to the President, Cabinet, and Academic Senate, to promote the cause of safety throughout the University campus, and to increase public safety among all members of the SF State campus community. The Advisory Committee will assist in describing the means for involving the SF State University Police Department (UPD) in achieving the University's goals of creating an environment which is most conducive to the mission of the University. 

B. Members 

1. Voting 

  • Alvin Alvarez, College of Health & Social Sciences 
  • Vacant, Faculty Representative 
  • Representatives from the Human Rights Commission, Community Representative Carina Gallo, Faculty Representative, Criminal Justice Studies, AY 21-23 
  • Vacant, ASI Student Representative 
  • Vacant, non-ASI Student Representative 
  • Vacant, non-ASI Student Representative 
    Bridget McCracken, Staff Representative, Public Affairs and Civic Engagement, AY 21-23 
  • Dae Philpot, Student Representative, AY 21-23 
  • Jules Kutner, Staff Representative (since March 2023), AY 23-25 
  • Enrique Vera Cruz, SFSU Public Safety Representative, AY 21-23

2. Ex-Officio 

  • Michael Beatty, Enterprise Risk Management 
  • Nicole Buitrago, Counseling and Psychological Services 
  • Cansu Badstubner, Counseling and Psychological Services (since April 2023) 
  • Vacant, Facilities Services 
  • Pam Su, co-Chair, Division of Student Life (cycling off) 
  • Reginald Parson, SFSU University Police Department 
  • George Haris, Housing 
  • Theresa Pollard, Human Resources (cycling off) 
  • Yunny Yip, Undergraduate Education and Academic Planning 
  • Fred Smith, Equity and Community Inclusion

C. Meetings 

The Public Safety Advisory Committee met on a monthly basis for AY 22-23, from September 2022 thru May 2023 – for a total of 9 meetings, each one hour long.

D. Scope of Work

PSAC has focused primarily on community engagement for AY 22-23. While the first year of PSAC’s existence focused on increasing the committee’s understanding of the operations, finances, staffing, and procedures related to public safety and UPD, the current year has shifted to engaging the SFSU community and initiating contact with various SFSU stakeholders. PSAC believes that it is essential for the group to obtain the input of the entire SFSU community regarding their public safety experiences on campus. In the long-term, PSAC also believes that continual engagement with the SFSU and developing long-term relationships and trust with the community is essential to the effectiveness and legitimacy of PSAC. To this end, the committee has focused its efforts on reaching out to different community groups to conduct small group Listening Circles, targeted at specific faculty, student and staff communities and governance groups across campus. Five Listening Circles have been conducted entirely among faculty and staff communities and groups. The faculty/staff Listening Circles have generally yielded the following broad themes:

  1. overall a strong positive experience with UPD and public safety, 
  2. limited interactions with UPD staff (e.g., opening offices, parking, etc.) and 
  3. concerns about safety during periods in which campus has fewer people or at night. 

Despite repeated attempts to reach out to various student groups and communities, the committee has been unsuccessful at conducting any Listening Circles with students. While there is continued belief that Listening Circles with students will be beneficial for in-depth feedback, it was equally clear that PSAC would need to develop alternative strategies for obtaining student input. Therefore, in Spring 2023, PSAC began to develop a student-focused, online survey that we anticipate will be ready for distribution in Fall 2023.

E. Issues and Recommendations 

The PSAC discussions highlighted a number of recurring issues that will necessitate further exploration in the AY 23-24:

  • Student Engagement: PSAC’s attempts to engage and contact various student group with no success, underscores the challenges and needs of reaching out to this community. It is hoped that the student survey will be a mechanism that will facilitate student engagement while also introducing students to the existence of PSAC as an advisory group. Similarly, it is hoped that the student survey may provide an entry into conducting more in-depth Listening Circles with students. 
  • Committee Representation - Students: PSAC has been faced with ongoing challenges in committee representation – particularly in terms of student representation. With regard to students, the majority of meetings in the current year had no students in attendance and at most, only one student in attendance. Despite the consensus that there needed to be a larger student voice on the committee and the fact that PSAC moved to increase representation to 4 students, only one of the student representatives was even identified and the remaining three student representatives were never identified for AY 22-23. In short, for AY 23-24, 4 students will need to be identified and appointed by Associated Students for staggered 1 and 2-year terms and the meeting time will need to be moved to a time that does not conflict with AS Board meetings 
  • Committee Representation – Turnover: PSAC is also currently facing significant turnover of its faculty and staff representatives, including the current co-chairs. As AY 22-23 ends, both co-chairs – Alvin Alvarez and Pam Su – will be rotating out of the committee and representatives from Academic Affairs and Student Affairs will need to be identified as cochairs for PSAC. Similarly, there will be a need to identify the following committee members: a) faculty representative for 1 year term, AY 23-24, b) faculty representative for 2-year term AY 23-25, c) staff representative for 1 year term, AY 23-24, d) community representative for 2-year term, AY 23-25. 
  • Roadmap: In light of the transitions within PSAC, the committee has developed a roadmap for next steps in AY 23-24 and has coordinated with Chief Parson to create a repository of information that will enable future iterations of PSAC to build up the current work.