Vol. 168, Issue 6 | November 6– November 20, 2019 | City College of San Francisco | Since 1935 | FREE
Bomb Scare Raises Alarms Around Emergency Text Notifications By Meyer Gorelick msggorelick@gmail.com
The bomb threat that prompted the evacuation of three buildings on Ocean campus on Oct. 17 was a false alarm, but raised questions over the emergency notification systems City College has in place. The City College Police Department worked in tandem with the SFPD, SFFD, and SFMTA to evacuate the MultiUse Building, Science Hall, and Creative Arts Building to search them with officers and bomb sniffing dogs. By 4:33 p.m. the sweep was complete and students and faculty began trickling back into the buildings. While no one was injured, concerns about the efficacy of communications with students and faculty in the event of a future emergency were triggered. Many students didn’t receive text message notifications alerting them to the threat. “I wish it had been announced in all places. I never got a text message, and I have my phone number listed, it’s the only one I have. I wish [the emergency notification system] was better in terms of safety,” said Luana Melnek, a physics major. Melnek wasn’t on campus during the bomb threat, and didn’t find out until the next day through other students. Tarik, an Electrical Engineering major who was evacuated from Science Hall during the bomb threat, also didn’t receive a text message. “I didn’t know about any procedures before our teacher telling us where to go,” said Tarik. In the event of an active shooter or higher level threat, A text message received by some students as an alert to avoid the area around City College after a bomb threat was emergency notifications and procedures could be vital. reported to the Ocean Campus on Oct. 17, 2019. Photo by Amal Ben Ghanem / The Guardsman During the recent outbreak of California wildfires, the office of student affairs sent an email out to students instructing number listed, a college spokesperson said: the call, is currently under investigation,” the same college them to update their Web4 profiles with a text message “The college encourages all members of the CCSF spokesperson said. notification number, despite the fact that most students community to confirm that their contact information in The Interim Chief of Police, Colleen Fatooh, could not already had their cell phone contact listed as their primary Web4 is accurate and up-to-date, and that all fields of the be reached for comment. phone number on the site. form profile are filled out. The College continually evaluates If you haven’t already done so, please log into your Web4 This is an additional step that could be missed by students and adjusts its emergency response protocols to ensure it profile, go to personal information, and add text message who don’t see the email or have trouble completing the steps can communicate as effectively as possible during times of notification number so that you will be alerted in the case laid out in an attached PDF. emergency.” of future emergencies. When asked why students are being required to upload No further details on the bomb threat were shared by a text notification number when there is already a primary campus officials. “The incident, including the origin of
Rodents Leave Unpleasant Surprise for Library ITS Workers By Lisa Martin
communications closet about two times a year. Before October’s incident, the last time lisamartin.562@gmail.com the closet had been accessed was in June Workers from City College’s information when the networking department replaced technology services (ITS) department made the switches. Rodent feces were found in the a gruesome discovery on Wednesday, Oct. closet then, as well. 23 when they opened a closet in Rosenberg Network Manager Tim Ryan is in Library and found rodent feces scattered charge of the networking department. He across the floor. was one of the workers who accessed the Upon their search of telecommunications closet in June. closet 406B, one of the workers saw a dead “[B]efore I would send a team of our rat and notified administrators that they technicians in there I just wanted to make would not be working in the room under sure that it wasn’t any kind of a safety hazard those conditions. or anything like that,” Ryan said. “So I put The closet is located to the right of the on a mask and some gloves and I vacuumed library’s entrance. Sources and photos of the it up in a few minutes and that’s all it took room confirm that the floor was covered in to clean it up at that time.” rat feces on that day. Devall and a member of the networking Alexandre Devall has worked in ITS at department checked the telecommunications City College for five years and said he had closet on Monday, Oct. 28, and even though never seen anything like it. the space had been cleaned, Devall said he “The floor was completely covered in rat saw there was feces again. “Not as many feces, I mean everywhere. In order to walk in as before, but you could see them on the there and not step on any rat feces you had ground,” he said. to be really careful. There was a dead rat “In response to issues raised earlier on the wall opposite of the main entrance,” this week, the College hired Orkin [a pest Devall said. control company] to analyze the situation ITS workers perform routine in Rosenberg Library and implement maintenance in this particular tele- appropriate remediation measures, which
is the standard course of action if rodents are reported in a campus building,” a spokesperson for the college said. The spokesperson said that issues with facilities could be directed to Dean of Evans and Southeast Center Torrance Bynum or submitted as a work-order through the school’s online SchoolDude request system. In the past, Orkin has laid out sticky traps at the library, surveyed the building and talked to employees about problem areas, according to one classified staff member. The issues with rodents are not isolated to this one telecommunications closet. Even if staff at the library hadn’t had encounters with rodents themselves, most of those spoken to had at least heard that there was an issue. When asked if there was an issue with rodents at the library a woman at the learning assistance center who did not give her name said, “Yes, but not overwhelming.” The offices of the Disabled Students Programs and Services (DSPS) are located on the third floor of the library. Although Olga Galvez has only been department chair of DSPS since July, she said she has also had a close encounter with a dead rodent.
She was in a third floor storage room at the library looking at some equipment, when she realized her foot was sticking to one of the Orkin sticky traps. She looked down and saw a dead mouse stuck to it as well. Galvez said none of her direct reports in DSPS had expressed any concerns to her about the rodent situation. When she reported her own encounter, she said the body was quickly cleaned up. A classified staff member from the second floor, who asked not to be named, said he believed a stricter enforcement of the food and drink policy and proper garbage disposal practices at the library would help discourage rodents from making the library their home. The official policy of the school is that food or beverages “MAY NOT BE TAKEN [sic] into auditoriums (including the Diego Rivera Theatre), classrooms, laboratories, gymnasiums or libraries,” as stated in both the Faculty Handbook and the Classified Employee Handbook put out by the college’s human resources department. Though this policy describes a total prohibition of food from these spaces, this is not what happens in practice at many City College buildings.