Yard Security

Burriss K. Young, associate dean of freshman, will meet with assorted freshmen, Harvard policemen and crime victims Thursday night to try to spread awareness of security procedures to freshmen.

At least one student, "volunteer or draftee," from each proctorial unit will attend the meeting, the Yard Security Committee's first, Young said yesterday. He added that the committee is designed "to alert people to the fact that we're living in the city."

Harvard policemen will brief the students on emergency phone locations and simple preventive measures like locking doors and bikes, and two upperclassmen who had problems with security as freshmen will also speak.

Freshmen on the committee act as liaisons between their peers and the police, Young said. The group will not be a structured organization, but a group of "informed people who feel they have a connection with the police," he added.

Lawrence Finley, a Harvard police sergeant said yesterday he will show a series of pictures of about 20 "awareness points" in the Yard, such as unlocked entry doors and of a ten-speed bicycle which "we could have stolen in ten seconds."

Young said he is not forming the committee in reaction to any particular event, adding that last year he, Saul Chafin, chief of police, and two students met periodically in a similar group. "We're talking to a population that's new in town, and the more aware they are the better," he said.

Finley said he has given similar presentations to security committees in several Houses, adding that the procedures he outlines are "ongoing crime prevention, not reactions to crisis situations."