Morgan State president pledges changes, including a security wall, at town hall a week after campus shooting
BALTIMORE — Morgan State University President David Wilson pledged a package of infrastructure and policy changes Tuesday night at a town hall with students and faculty, a week after a shooting on campus injured five people.
Wilson said the university will ask the Maryland state legislature and congressional delegation for $22,225,000 to spend on security upgrades, including $6.4 million for a wall, $4 million for electronic locks and $3 million on cameras.
“We are now exploring as a goal to enclose 90% of the campus in order to eliminate unfettered access,” Wilson said. “In order to enter campus, you’ll have to show ID or show you are coming for a purpose for which this campus actually exists, which is learning, research, service, outreach and things like that. That’s what the plan is.”
Wilson said the plan would add approximately 1 1/2 miles of walls around campus, and that the university is also exploring metal detectors and artificial intelligence to detect guns.
Wilson, who said he received a vote of confidence for support from Gov. Wes Moore in a phone call the night of the shooting, did not offer a timetable for the changes beyond “as soon as possible.”
Four of the five people injured in the shooting Oct. 3 around the area of Thurgood Marshall Hall, one of Morgan State’s six on-campus residential facilities that has a first-floor dining hall, were students. All victims have been released from the hospital, The Associated Press reported.
Classes resumed Monday after both academics and homecoming activities were canceled last week. No arrests have been made as police released new photos of suspects Tuesday.
Wilson said that over the past week an armed officer has been stationed outside Thurgood Marshall Hall around the clock while contracted security patrol has been increased across campus.
During the town hall, students described mass confusion in the aftermath of the shooting and criticized the campus alert system and security infrastructure. Over 200 students attended the town hall, which lasted nearly three hours.
“Some people were in the Thurgood dining hall when all that happened,” Kae Dennis, a sophomore from Harford County, told Wilson. “They were left scrambling around and wondering what to do.”
Joshua Hamlett, a senior computer science major from Baltimore, told Wilson the shooting occurred at 9:27 p.m. but that he did not receive any official communication from the university until an email arrived over an hour later.
“In the moment we were very confused about what was going on. We had all just run out of a building, and then as we get outside, we’re asking questions like ‘Wait, this was a shooting? I didn’t hear any shots.’ And then we’re trying to run back into the building,” Hamlett said.
Morgan State University Police Chief Lance Hatcher said he sent out a text message emergency alert about the shooting at 9:30 p.m. but that students are not automatically enrolled in the emergency alert system.
“It is an opt-in program right now. Opt in means you have to physically opt into it,” Hatcher said. “We are exploring with our vendor to see if we can have an opt out, meaning once you register as a student or become an employee, you are automatically opted into the program.”
Students also said blue light emergency call boxes are not always functional, prompting Wilson and Hatcher to pledge to personally examine each one this week.
“If you put up walls, who is going to actually watch the walls?” Hamlett said after the town hall. “If you’re not actively enforcing these ingress and egress points, then there really won’t be any change. You’ll just be confining the area where there might be a problem.”
Morgan State officials declined to answer questions following the town hall.
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