U. is negotiating new contract with McGinn

The University is negotiating a new contract with McGinn Security, the firm which supplies security guards for all University residences, despite plans to eventually eliminate the need for outside guard services. According to Residential Living Director Gigi Simeone, the University plans to develop and train its own internal security guards to work in the residences. The new contract with McGinn, Simeone said, will allow the University to back out if it gives McGinn several months warning. A 1988 analysis of campus security commissioned by the University recommended replacing security guards hired from outside firms with internal University security guards. Simeone said the proposed contract has been approved in principle by McGinn and is presently being reviewed by the University's legal counsel. Joe McGinn, the security firm's owner, did not return several messages left at its office yesterday. Simeone would not release other specific details about the contract but said the guards will receive a pay raise. She added that the University hopes to have the contract signed later this spring. The University has had problems with McGinn guards in the past. Six months after hiring the firm in 1987, allegations that guards were sleeping on the job and leaving their posts while on duty raised concerns about the agency. In addition, two years ago a McGinn guard on duty in Van Pelt College House was arrested for allegedly harassing several University students and injuring a University Police officer. The guard was apparently intoxicated during the incident. The guard was later found to have an extensive criminal record, causing the administration to threaten to end their relationship with McGinn if they did not conduct mandatory background checks of all security guards. But Deputy Vice Provost George Koval said last week the University has been satisfied with the security coverage McGinn has provided recently and has not heard any complaints from students. "We have not heard from students that they've been displeased with residential security," Koval said. "We meet with [Undergraduate Assembly] groups, as well as with the University Council's Safety and Security Committee, and haven't heard complaints." "We've been pleased with McGinn," Simeone added. "We meet weekly with them and they are very responsive to our concerns. They provide an average of over 1000 hours of security coverage per week and the problems that we've had with them have been minimal versus the amount of coverage they've provided." Safety and Security Committee Co-Chairperson Jeffrey Jacobson, a College junior, said last night the University is not replacing McGinn guards because of sub-par security coverage, but because the University is looking to internalize all of its security personnel as recommended by the 1988 report. "The Wharton and Nursing schools hire their own guards from other companies," Jacobson said. "It's not just McGinn. We're looking to centralize all security personnel under the University." Jacobson said having security guards hired by the University would allow the University to give the guards specialized training they might not otherwise receive. "Our police officers already go through a number of hours of sensitivity and diversity training," Jacobson said. "Contracted guards don't really get that kind of training." "We want people at those guard stations that have a real vested interest in protecting University people and property," he added.

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