New lock system in chemistry-geology adds security

The renovated chemistry and geology building is the first building on campus that will require faculty and staff to swipe an ID card to unlock interior doors.

The Schlage Control Access System was installed in the building, built in 1961, as it underwent a $7,041,000 renovation, which began in fall 2009. The building, has reopened this semester for classes, although it still is not ready for labs.

"All of the doors on the inside of the building have the black boxes on them except for the restrooms," Sgt. Ben Peña, district department of public safety, said Monday.

The outside doors also have the system. Only faculty and adjunct staff members who have been authorized by their department head have access to those doors, he said.

"Faculty members that work longer hours will need to get their card approved before they can have that access," Peña, said.

To get an ID for the system, faculty and staff have to go through the Alamo Colleges police department. Campus police made IDs last fall for faculty and staff in anticipation of this system being installed.

"Each door is a different level of security and requires a key to open it," Peña said. For example, faculty and staff will not be able to access the same doors as the department chair.

Peña said, the department chair or the administrator must give the approval to get access to various levels.

"Students who want into the classroom will have to wait for their professor to let them in," Roger Stanley, chair of chemistry and geology, said Aug. 27.

"When you swipe your card in front of the box, it will turn green, and that unlocks the door," Peña said.

He said the box would turn red and the door would lock, if it wasn't opened fast enough.

"If I lose my card, all I have to do is make a phone call and the door is unlocked," Stanley said. "If you lose a regular key, all the locks have to be changed. If you lose the scanner ID you can just get another one."

Peña said the system is controlled through a server and with the touch of a button the district department of public safety can lock or unlock any of the doors.

He said this system has come about to give students better security after the Virginia Tech shooting April 16, 2007, made colleges aware of a need for a campus lockdown. Thirty-two people were killed and 20 injured by a student who then killed himself.

"The system runs on a time lock, which means the doors lock when the last person is out of the building and opens when the classes are ready to begin," he said.

The Schlage Control Access System is also installed on the outside of buildings on Palo Alto, St. Philip's, Northeast Lakeview and Northwest Vista campuses as well as the outside doors of the nursing and allied health complex and the academic instruction center at this college.

"The ultimate goal is to have all buildings on all of the Alamo colleges have this system," Peña said.

John Strybos, associate vice chancellor of facilities operation and construction management, said he wouldn't be able to get the total cost of the system until later this week.