Patriotic Protection

Jul 1, 2006 12:00 PM, By Carol Carey

George Mason University (GMU) is bursting with pride — and record enrollment. The home of the GMU Patriots basketball team watched its applications soar after the Patriots upset top-ranked University of Connecticut (UConn) this past spring to become one of the National Collegiate Athletic Association's (NCAA) Final Four contenders for the college basketball championship.

“We're expecting 1,600 to 1,700 freshmen this fall. In the past, we would typically enroll 1,200 to 1,400 freshmen. Now, we have gotten more students than we have room for — the first year it has happened to this magnitude,” says Steve Morehouse, associate director, Office of Housing and Residence Life for the 29,000-student university located in the metropolitan Washington D.C. area.

The university, says Morehouse, will accommodate the overflow of students in temporary housing such as hotels until the effects of attrition and new construction can kick in. The Fairfax County (Va.) campus is situated in an area that is experiencing significant growth, another contributing factor to the rise in student population, Morehouse says.

Access control system provides multiple safeguards

With new construction has come enhanced security. The Stanley Security Systems Inc. access control system, with B.A.S.I.S. ET605 software by Best Access Systems, has been installed in a server on-campus and is operated from seven workstations at the housing office. It runs on the university's local area network (LAN). Its components were installed at the 500-student Liberty Square and Potomac Heights residence halls as part of their construction in 2003 and 2004.

Best Access is a division of Stanley Security, which is located in Indianapolis. The system links Stanley IDH Max on-line readers, used for all exterior doors and common areas at the residence halls, to a series of control panels. Expansion is possible with additional control panels and software licenses. Standalone, battery-operated BASIS G readers are used off-line for interior doors and student rooms.

The Stanley Data-Link provides database interface between the off-line BASIS G system and the on-line database. “Both products can be programmed and read through the same software,” Morehouse says. “There are separate tracks for the on-line and off-line locks. Because the off-line product is stand-alone, you must go to the site of the lock to re-encode it, and issue the student a new card. The on-line track can be deleted instantly over the computer and recoded.”

While mechanical keys exist for all locks, students are issued only the Stanley One Card magstripe cards. The cards are issued at the Student ID office after being programmed with access information received from the housing department. Off-line access information (for interior doors) is programmed at the housing office. The same cards are also used by students for food service and other housing-related services, including copiers, printers and vending machines.

Liberty Square residence hall has the most extensive use of readers — 600 in all. Here, every interior door — including stairwells, elevators, corridors, computer labs and offices — requires card access. “All exterior doors and all entry doors to student apartments require card access in both halls,” Morehouse says.

Both Liberty Square and Potomac Heights also have CCTV, using a Dedicated Micros DVR with 16 Pelco fixed, color cameras. The CCTV system is currently not integrated with the access control system at these halls.

Cameras, access control deter crime

GMU seeks to be proactive in affording its students maximum safety, and the security system has already proved itself to be a powerful deterrent, Morehouse says.

“We have a parking gate near the Liberty Square residence hall, which allows residents into parking areas. Before we installed cameras, the area was broken into twice a week, on average. Since installation of the cameras, the gate has not been breached,” he says. “The cameras give us the ability to record the type of vehicle and license plate numbers for identification. Similarly, cameras in the residence hall hallways are a good deterrent against crime. And the access control system is set up so that residents must swipe their cards at least twice, for entry into exterior and interior doors — providing an extra safeguard.”

Just as the camera installation at the parking areas has provided a strong deterrent to crime, the reporting capabilities of the access control and CCTV systems at the halls have been effective, Morehouse says. “A student may report something, such as a TV, stolen from their room. We can download information from the lock to see if there was entry into the room by anyone other than the student. The report may show that the theft was likely the result of the student having left the door propped open for a significant length of time.

“Similarly, because the camera points are always being recorded, they are a tremendous help to us should we need to identify intruders — and we believe they are a significant deterrent to intruders.

Of GMU's three campuses, the largest, Fairfax, has the majority of student housing. Approximately 4,000 students live in some 70 buildings, which include residence halls (approximately 30) and townhouse-style apartments. The Fairfax campus, situated on 677 wooded acres, is a 35-minute subway ride (about 14 miles) from Washington, D.C. The two other campuses are Arlington and Prince William.

The campus is in an affluent, low-crime area, Morehouse says. “It's a bedroom community,” he says, where security issues are “no different than any other university that houses teens.” He acknowledges that GMU's proximity to the nation's capital has helped make security a priority.

Renovations provide opportunity for security upgrades

While wiring and installation of security hardware is most convenient during building construction, renovations provide another opportunity for upgrades. GMU is taking advantage of building renovations to install new or upgraded security systems. This summer, for instance, the Housing Office will link the ET 605 Access Control system to two residence halls, Dominion and Commonwealth, each with about 250 students. This is part of housing's goal to phase in access control at the halls as they are renovated.

“We are working with the architect who is doing renovations in our President's Park area, where residence halls house freshmen. The firm will be putting in drop ceilings, which are more conducive to CCTV. This will also allow us to run cabling for access control between the ceiling and roof,” he adds.

University police, private guards bolster security

The Housing Office uses a private security service, Securitas Inc., for evening/early morning patrols of its residence hall areas. “They make rounds, do reports, and deal with anyone who is breaking laws,” Morehouse says.

The private security staff also works closely with GMU's University Police Department, comprised of state-certified police officers. They, in turn, work closely with Virginia State Police and local police departments. The University Police regularly patrol the streets, parking lots, buildings and grounds of the three GMU campuses. They use motor, foot and bicycle patrols. University buildings are secured by key or card-lock systems, with after-hours access to locked buildings restricted to authorized persons.

A Police Cadet program, established in 2003, offers an escort service, performs security patrols and supplements officers during special events. The cadets are students, working part-time and supervised by the University Police.

Security is further enhanced on campus by lighting and emergency call boxes. The Ritron call boxes can be identified by their bright color. Blue lights illuminate them at night, allowing immediate communication with University Police or the campus escort service.

Security increases with new construction

Building has begun on another residence hall, which will house approximately 1,000 students and be completed in three phases: August 2007, spring and then summer of 2008. This residence hall, currently named “Housing 7,” will be the first to have integrated CCTV and access control.

The ET605 software has the capacity to link digital video to specific alarms, and allows users the option of presetting pan/tilt/zoom IP cameras to the desired location, where they begin recording when an alarm is generated. With the matrix view feature, up to 32 different windows of live or recorded video can be displayed at once.

Still another innovation planned for the near future is an ID kiosk. Morehouse expects housing's job of issuing and replacing lost ID cards to be streamlined by the use of ID kiosks, one of which is currently being piloted at the lobby of Potomac Heights residence hall. Still in the development stage, the station, called the Stanley ID Express Station System, will allow students to obtain temporary ID cards which will be good for a limited number of transactions (perhaps one to three), until the student can get a permanent card from housing.

ABOUT THE COMPANIES

For information, circle the Reader Service number (listed below) or visit securitysolutions.com

Dedicated Micros	8
Pelco	9
Ritron	10
Stanley Security Systems Inc.	11
Securitas Inc.	12

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