Cousens Gym has heightened its security measures this semester, requiring students to show their ID cards at the entrance and closing off all but one exit.
The increase was a reaction to a series of trespassing incidents that took place last year, according to Assistant Director of Public and Environmental Safety Ron Brevard.
Most frequently, unauthorized men walked into the female locker rooms on the gym's first floor.
"While we've been looking and reviewing security procedures for a period of time, the trespassing incidents [from last year] brought everything to the surface," Brevard said. "It caused us to improve our security not only with new equipment but with new procedures as well."
In order to step up security measures, TUPD closed off all but one entrance to the gym, leaving one central place to enter and exit on the main level.
While some other buildings on campus also have security guards at their entrances, the gym is the only one where incomers are required to show a Tufts ID.
"One of the reasons we ask for ID... is that the facilities are limited and we have so many outside users that if we just allowed carte blanche entry, people would use the gym as their own personal fitness center," TUPD Captain Mark Keith said. "There are not enough facilities to serve [students] - never mind everyone else."
Although it is too early to tell whether the new security measures have made a lasting difference, Brevard said that so far, he has seen an improvement since last year, both in Cousens and the nearby Gantcher Center. "The theft reports haven't been too bad down in Cousens and Gantcher," he said.
In one case last week, a guard was escorted off the premises and fired after a lieutenant from the TUPD went down to speak with him.
"He wasn't dismissed because he didn't ask for Tufts ID," Keith said, responding to recent rumors. "Other things [were involved in] his dismissal, including issues of insubordination." TUPD would not reveal the name of the guard.
While all security guards come from an outside contract service, Brevard said that TUPD "monitors the performance of all the guards throughout the campus. ... We work closely with them."
"If we don't think someone is a good fit for our environment, we can ask [the contracting service that provides the security guards] to remove them and send them somewhere else," Keith said.
