editorial: End the campus secrets

TU Editorial Board

Our opinion: A plan to report violent felonies and student disappearances is pointless if campuses don’t follow through. We need a clearer law.

A bit of common sense has been lacking at colleges and universities since they were told 16 years ago to work with local law enforcement to devise notification plans when a violent felony occurs on campus or a student goes missing.

Although the campuses crafted the plans, they haven’t actually been notifying local authorities, according to legislation proposed by state Sen. Kathy Marchione, R-Halfmoon. That’s hardly the spirit of the law.

In 1999, a year after Suzanne Lyall disappeared from the University at Albany, her parents, Doug and Mary Lyall, helped secure passage of the Campus Safety Act, which required campuses to craft notification plans with local law enforcement to avoid delays that can occur when authorities assume “kids are being kids.” Though local law enforcement was promptly notified after Ms. Lyall’s disappearance, her parents argued that if such notification plans had already been worked out, any delays would have been avoided.

http://blog.timesunion.com/opinion/end-the-campus-secrets/29423/