Since 2013, the university has tightened rooftop security precautions of the J.D. Williams Library because of the evidence students were drinking alcohol on the roof, at the risk of falling four stories.
“It was getting bad,” Stan Whitehorn, head of library facilities, said. “(The University Police Department) was catching people up there a lot.”
Whitehorn, who has been working with the library for 17 years, said students accessing the roof wasn’t a problem until a freshman bucket list was published with the rooftop access as a challenge.
Now, however, the number of violators has dwindled drastically, Whitehorn said.
The current system immediately sends multiple emails with pictures of surveillance footage to Whitehorn and the University Police Department, who will arrive within minutes, whenever a trespasser has been detected.
Whitehorn said, at the peak, UPD was catching students on the rooftop at least twice a week.
“If (students) get up there, a policeman will meet them when they come down … that’s a guarantee,” Whitehorn said. “You may get on the roof, but you’re going to go away in cuffs.
