An Update from the Department of Public Safety 10/19/22

Dear Tufts community members,

I am writing today to share news of changes we have implemented in the Department of Public Safety (DPS) in our continued efforts to support President Monaco’s commitment to Tufts as an anti-racist institution. As you will recall, five workstreams were charged in 2020 with outlining steps for eradicating structural racism across the university. In April, I reported on DPS’s progress toward meeting the recommendations of the Campus Safety and Policing workstream’s report, and today, in the spirit of continued transparency, I am pleased to provide additional updates.

Over the summer, we updated the department’s mission and vision statements and core values to clearly reflect our commitment to ensuring the physical, psychological, and emotional safety of all members of the Tufts community. This was foundational to the other changes we have been making, including expanding training for all officers to focus on implicit bias, harassment discrimination, active bystandership, and mental health awareness. This summer, training around empathy and healing was taught by a non-law enforcement agency and will be extended to additional members of the Department of Public Safety in the future.

We also created two new roles within DPS to improve communication and transparency and support a hybrid response model. Our recently hired communications manager is responsible for keeping our website and social channels updated and for ensuring that the community is informed. The recently added campus security officer manager (CSO) will bring more CSOs to the Medford/Somerville campus responsible for non-emergency incidents such as lockouts and lost property, increasing the use of non-sworn personnel for routine services that do not require a uniformed officer. (CSOs are already active on the SMFA and Boston Health Sciences campuses.) Both roles will serve to strengthen the department’s relationship with the campus community. We also are looking forward to welcoming our first comfort dog to assist during non-emergency and mental health incidents on the Medford/Somerville campus. Community members can also expect to see a new and less imposing police cruiser design and new uniform patches that express our commitment to the community. A survey to address feedback from the campus community regarding these changes is also being developed for release next fall.

While we have made progress over the last several months in transforming the Department of Public Safety to support the university’s anti-racist goals, there is more ahead. To learn about what is new and upcoming in DPS, please visit our DPS Progress Dashboard. If you have any questions or comments, please do not hesitate to reach out to publicsafety-inquiries@elist.tufts.edu. You can also stay updated by following us on Instagram and visiting the Public Safety website.

With warm regards,

Yolanda Smith, Executive Director of Public Safety