Police officers were not at the site of an emergency when they visited Baker University Center yesterday afternoon.
Instead, about 15 students showed up for pizza and discussion with police officers from Athens and Ohio University Police Departments, who reminded students to be “smart, civil and safe” this weekend.
Student Senate and the Environmental Health and Safety Department collaborated on “Pizza with the Police.” Athens Police, OU Police, the Survivor Advocacy Program and the Environmental Health and Safety Department spoke to attendees as they ate free pizza.
The hour-long event gave students the opportunity to ask questions they had about safety or that they wanted to ask a policeman, said Mary Kate Gallagher, the Health and Safety delegate for Student Senate.
Athens Police Chief Tom Pyle said that if he hadn’t been invited to speak with students, he would have crashed it anyway.
“I want to be here in total support of any student initiative that deals with safety for students,” Pyle said.
With Palmerfest coming up this weekend and the recent sexual assault cases off-campus, safety is an important issue to both police departments.
“We’re there for safety, and we’re not there for confrontation,” Pyle said. “I want people to be safe at all times. There are things that people can do to protect themselves, and doing those things is not foolish.”
Both police departments will have extra officers working throughout the weekend to deal with any potentially dangerous situations.
Both students and non-students burn couches and commit other crimes, said OU Police Chief Andrew Powers.
“The message is that it’s dangerous no matter who’s doing it,” Powers said. “It endangers the safety of students, and it endangers the safety of the people that live on Palmer Street, whose homes could catch fire.”
At last year’s Palmerfest, students lit fires in the streets. Pyle said he hopes students will avoid this and other dangerous behaviors this weekend.
Rebekah Kay, a senior studying theater performance, said she loves coming to events with police because she always has lots of questions and that all of the officers she spoke with were really open to what she had to say.
“Being an RA, I probably will deal with the aftermath of Palmerfest,” Kay said. “Just like the police, we’re not there to get anyone in trouble. We just want to make sure that it’s a safe environment for everyone.”
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