Berkeley – The Peralta Community College District’s Interim Executive Director of Community Safety, Abdul Pridgen, announced the imminent return of Peralta armed “peace officers” on and around district campuses during a presentation at the Board of Trustees study session on Feb. 24.
The district will have to seek its own California Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) certification as a participating organization. In an email to The Citizen, Pridgen wrote that he anticipates the process to certify the district will take several months.
Trustees voted unanimously to approve the district’s participation in the POST program at their regular meeting on March 10.
According to Pridgen, a district POST certification will allow him to access “regional intelligence sharing” between local law enforcement and emergency responder agencies. This includes monthly meetings between first responder agencies countywide.
The employment of POST certified officers at California colleges is established under state legislature as the ability for colleges to create their own internal “college police.” However, Pridgen wrote in an email to The Citizen that the only similarity between the disbanded Peralta Police Department and this “community safety model” is their POST certification.
The last time Peralta had its own police department was in 1995, when the 12-officer force dissolved following the fatal shooting of lieutenant Herbert Stovall on Aug. 16 of that year.
As part of Pridgen’s presentation, a cost comparison estimated an in-house safety model could save the district around $1 million compared to previous $7.9 million contract and current $5.45 million contracts with private security companies. The speaker notes from the presentation includes estimates for expenses like equipment, software and licensing, certifications, and hiring costs.
Armed officers in the new hybrid safety model include a lieutenant, a sergeant, and at least five “sworn officers” with POST certifications.
Pridgen said that the “integration of mental health support” sets the security model apart from other Bay Area community colleges. The hybrid safety model includes the assignment of two districtwide behavioral specialists and 10-12 “community safety services assistants” to provide unarmed, “trauma-informed” support, who would serve under the sergeant.
The community safety model details a three-tiered response to incidents based on the nature of the situation.
According to Pridgen’s presentation, the first tier is a “prevention and deescalation” response by student safety aides, pre-sworn cadets, and community safety service assistants.
The second tier of incident response is support, calling on community safety service assistants and behavioral health coordinators to offer referrals to counseling, basic needs, and calls to county services if necessary.
The third tier is POST-incident critical support, deployed during imminent threats like crimes in process or weapons on campus. All three tiers are expected to integrate “trauma-informed” mental health support at every level of operation.
Pridgen started the conversation about the “hybrid holistic community safety model” in Sept. 2024. Through the process of Peralta’s shared governance, the district community decided to pursue “trauma-informed, culturally responsive, and equity-driven” responses to incidents on campus.
Timeline
The district-approved process began at the Board of Trustees regular meeting on March 10 with the approval of a POST certification resolution.
As laid out in Pridgen’s presentation, the district will approve the job descriptions for lieutenant and sergeant and hire a part time lieutenant by the end of this month.
Pridgen said the district will hire an Executive Director of Community Safety, a lieutenant, a sergeant, and two to three community safety assistants between July and September.
The district will also hire two to three sworn officers, behavioral health specialists, and reduce the role of third party security between October and December.
District security cameras and artificial intelligence
During the presentation, Pridgen stated the district is “leveraging the technology” it already has by integrating artificial intelligence into security cameras districtwide.
Pridgen said that the use of artificial intelligence allows “for the detection of activity after hours and for greater visibility of campus resources,” and gave examples of how the system already notifies security when theater students at Laney College perform stage fights, or when nursing students at Merritt College practice giving care to someone lying on the ground.
The trustees also voted to expand the district’s existing contract with NetXperts for the installation of Valcom, an emergency notification paging service that can broadcast messages through the speaker on in-class landlines.
Board President Louis Quindlen voiced his concerns about the cost of technology, requesting that the safety committee “makes a strong commitment to maintaining that technology.”
He also stressed the importance of student awareness of the changes coming to Peralta.
District Chancellor Tammeil Gilkerson said that regular feedback would be integrated into the process as implementation proceeds.
“Safety is not something that we only contract out, it is something that we create together,” Gilkerson said.
