Brown and White Vol. 131 no. 3

              The Brown and White Vol. 131 No. 3
Friday, September 16, 2016 ‘All the Lehigh News First’
First-years,
upperclassmen
integrated in
residence halls
Eyes in the sky at Lehigh
Courtesy of Peter Linehan/Creative Commons
The Lehigh University Police Department purchased a drone more than a year ago. It plans to use the
drone for surveillance at both on- and off-campus locations, said Edward Shupp, the chief of the LUPD.
By TANNER BUSS
B&W Staff
The Lehigh University Police
Department has acquired a new
drone to assist their crime pre-vention
unit.
Edward Shupp, the chief of
the Lehigh University Police
Department, said the drone
was acquired approximately
15 months ago using the police
department’s funds. Officer Drew
Devery, of the crime prevention
unit, is responsible for managing
and maintaining the drone.
Shupp said privacy policies do
not apply to the department’s
drone, and any information and
evidence acquired through the
drone can be used by the police
department. As long as the drone
is flying under Federal Aviation
Administration regulations,
LUPD can use the drone for any
purpose.
The drone has many features
that will improve the depart-ment’s
ability to survey areas on
and around campus, Shupp said.
It is equipped with a high-defini-tion
camera and a thermo-imag-ing
camera, both of which allow
the operator to watch over crowds
or track a specific individual. The
device can also reach the maxi-mum
FAA regulated flying height
of 400 feet.
Shupp did not offer specific
information about what the drone
is used for, but explained why he
thinks it is important to the cam-pus
community.
“There are a lot of camps and
conferences around here, as well
as children — we have a daycare
By KARLI WACHTEL
B&W Staff
First-year students and upper-classmen
are living in the same res-idence
halls, and on the same floors.
The Office of Residence Life hopes
to promote inclusion by integrating
students of different class years into
the same residence halls and cre-ating
new themed, interest-based
communities. The buildings that
have undergone the new rearrange-ments
include Richards, Smiley and
Thornburg houses — all of which
solely housed first-years and their
Gryphons in the past.
Angie Rizzo, ’19, who is a Gryphon
in Drinker this year, said she did not
know what to expect when meeting
her residents for the first time. She
guessed the sophomores would either
be involved, mentor-like members
of the hall or absent from the new
living community.
“I was definitely worried about
there being a divide between sopho-mores
and freshmen,” Rizzo said.
While this may have been the case
at first, Rizzo said she has been
pleased with her hall’s dynamic.
During the first official hall meeting,
everyone participated and interacted
with one another.
“When we were having a discus-sion
about the Principles of Our
Equitable Community, the sopho-
Gnat attack: bugs swarm residences, buildings
By CHRISTOPHER GAETANO
B&W Staff
In the past week there were
four reports of gnat infestations
in sorority houses on the Hill and
a heavy presence of gnats near
STEPS, Maginnes Hall and Sayre
Field.
This was the first time
Residential Services had to deal
with an infestation of this mag-nitude,
said Ozzie Breiner, the
director of the office.
Members of several sorori-ties
called Residential Services
to inform the office of the issue,
Breiner said. However, students
living in the Zeta Tau Alpha house
had to take matters into their own
hands when they noticed the gnats
on the night of Sept. 8, said Sara
Lampert, the house manger of
Zeta Tau Alpha.
“(At) about 9 p.m. we started to
notice (the gnats),” Lampert said.
“Someone came up to my room and
told me that there
were bugs in the
kitchen.”
Many of the sis-ters
initially pan-icked
at the sight
of the gnats, she
said. Throughout
the night, the
women became
increasingly con-cerned
as more gnats started to
appear throughout the house.
The gnats hatched in the wood-ed
area near the top of the Hill
and then migrated in the direction
of the sorority houses, as they are
attracted to light, Breiner said.
The rooms in the ZTA house
that were most affected by the
infestation were those that had
their windows facing the woods,
Lampert said.
Residential Services offered tips
to students to help them keep
their rooms clear of bugs.
“Keep the lights
off as much as
possible because
they’re drawn to
light,” Breiner
said.
Students were
also advised to
keep their doors
shut and windows
closed, as a win-dow
screen alone will not prevent
gnats from entering a place of res-idency,
he said.
“They can get in pretty much
anywhere,” Breiner said. “Even if
your screen is intact, they are so
small that they can find tiny areas
to get in.”
The ZTA sisters tried to use
alternative methods to capture the
gnats, Lampert said. They opened
a jar of honey to see if the gnats
would flock to it, which they did.
However, the idea only served
as a short-term solution, Lampert
said. The women then turned off
the lights in the rooms without
gnats, and kept the lights on in the
rooms that were already infested,
trapping the gnats. A majority
of the gnats were dead by the
following morning, and no known
damage occurred as a result of the
infestation.
Breiner said Lehigh hired Rid-et
Pest Control of Nazareth to assess
the severity of the infestation. The
company ultimately deemed the
gnats harmless.
Students reached out to Residential Services in
response to an infestation of gnats
See RES LIFE Page 4 See DRONES Page 3
See GNATS Page 4
“They can get
in pretty much
anywhere.
Ozzie Breiner
Director of Residential Services ”