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Blue lights on campus protect the students in case of emergencies. Justin Keyes • The Daily Beacon

Campus blue lights go largely unused in age of cell phone Altaf Nanavati Copy Editor ack of cell phone service should not stop anyone on campus from simply being able to call 911. The University of Tennessee Police Department and UT Facilities Services have installed up to 155 emergency phone units all across the college campus, so students, faculty, staff or anyone present on campus to send out an alert for an emergency or report a crime. Every phone has a blue light that goes off each time it is utilized, which explains the title, blue-light phones. UTPD Deputy Chief Keith Lambert explained the initial process for choosing where these phone units should be placed. “We try to look at primary locations where there is a heavy presence for pedestrian traffic such as areas near the library and the TRECS,” Lambert said. Every blue phone has a dial pad, instructions, speaker and a variety of safety numbers, including one that would connect that user the UT police. To the casual observer, however, the blue phone has two large buttons. The one that people will most likely use is the red “push for help” button, which will immediately connect you to a 911 emergency operator. The black button is for anyone on campus who is not feeling safe walking alone and would prefer a safer means for transportation. Within the UTPD, officers have also been able to take advantage of these phones. “Their greatest current benefit to us is that we can broadcast emergency messag-

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es over the speakers on the phones and warn people in case of an emergency,” Chief of Police Troy Lane said. Despite the variety of services they have to offer, including a convenient form of communication with the police department, these blue light phones have been gathering dust due to cellular devices or smartphones that can fit in the palm of one’s hand. “In the nearly 4 years I have been here, I cannot think of a single time a blue light phone has been used to report an emergency,” Lane said. “I believe this is because most of our students, faculty, staff and visitors have cell phones, and most often people activate blue light phones out of curiosity and then leave the area.” Dave Irvin, associate vice chancellor at Facilities Services, pointed out that these phones could still be of use, even with the rise of cell phone use. “It’s nice to know that that kind of security feature is reliable and dependable if somebody really needed it,” Irvin said. In addition, as Lane and Lambert have both pointed out, even the police department has not had any recent case where they had to report through the speakers on the blue light phones. The units are still well maintained, however, with UTPD dropping by for weekly check-ins and Facilities Services doing quarterly checks. In order to assure that the messages which are sent using the blue-light phone stands are clear and non-existent of any sort of disturbance, UTPD activates each of the units and makes sure that the speaker and the PA system is working correctly. See BLUE LIGHTS on Page 2

Wednesday, November 4, 2015


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