By Kelsey Durham
State lawmakers recently passed legislation that one Bayside representative believes will help better protect students on college campuses across the state from violent crimes.
State Assemblyman Ed Braunstein (D-Bayside) partnered with state Sen. Kathleen Marchione (R-Halfmoon), a representative from Saratoga County, to introduce a bill last year aimed at improving the 15-year-old Campus Safety Act by creating stricter regulations on how schools are required to deal with violent crimes that occur on school property.
The bill, which unanimously passed the Assembly May 5 and the Senate June 11, would update existing laws to mandate that colleges and universities wait no more than 24 hours after receiving a report of a violent felony or missing person before notifying law enforcement.
“There is currently no law requiring that colleges and universities in New York, when informed about violent crimes committed on campus, notify local authorities in a timely manner,” Braunstein said. “This legislation will lead to an increased prosecution of criminals by ensuring that these assaults are reported to local law enforcement agencies, which are more properly trained to investigate serious criminal issues.”
Braunstein said his bill was supported by studies from the U.S. Department of Justice and the White House Council on Women and Girls, which show that one in five female college students has been the victim of a sexual assault, but only about 12 percent reported the crime to authorities.
The assemblyman said the new regulations will prevent schools from trying to hide crimes from the public and will ensure that students and their parents are not given false information about the safety of a school they are considering for college.
“Colleges and universities sometimes attempt to handle these incidents in-house out of fear of generating negative publicity,” Braunstein said. “All too frequently, we hear stories about on-campus crimes, often sexual in nature, that are swept under the rug by colleges in an effort to protect their reputation. The perpetrators of these crimes should be prosecuted in a court of law.”
But Braunstein also said the bill has a loophole that also ensures it complies with the Campus Sexual Assault Victims’ Bill of Rights, a federal piece of legislation that gives the victim of a sexual offense the right to deny reporting the crime to police, if they choose.
The assemblyman said the passage of the bill is the first step toward combating a rising number of violent campus crimes and will go a long way to give parents peace of mind while their children are away at school.
“The passage of the campus safety bill sends a strong message that New York state is taking the problem of campus sexual assault seriously,” he said. “More can, and should, be done to protect our students and ensure that college campuses are kept as safe as possible.”
Reach reporter Kelsey Durham at 718-260-4573 or by e-mail at kdurham@cnglocal.com.
