Gilroy
– Officials at Gilroy High School hope a new campus supervisor
who joins their staff Monday will prevent future vehicle break-ins,
after a string of four burglaries in one day last month.
By Lori Stuenkel
Gilroy – Officials at Gilroy High School hope a new campus supervisor who joins their staff Monday will prevent future vehicle break-ins, after a string of four burglaries in one day last month.
The high school’s staff of seven campus supervisors was reduced to six following the Christmas holiday break, when Andrew Ojeda, a supervisor for almost 16 years, retired, said Assistant Principal Mani Corzo.
Monday, a seventh supervisor will allow for increased patrols in the student parking lot, where thieves burglarized four cars on Feb. 4.
The cars, parked close to each other in the student parking lot, were broken into some time during the morning’s classes. The suspects jammed the cars’ locks to gain entry, Corzo said. Students are not allowed in the parking lot during the school day.
Among CDs and other personal items stolen were stereos, amplifiers, and a bag containing basketball gear and shoes.
No burglaries had been reported before that day, and none have been reported since, Corzo said.
Security cameras on campus, mounted since last fall on the roofs of several buildings, can capture images from nearly all areas of the parking lot, Corzo said. They can record as far away as the tennis courts, at the very southern edge of the 750 W. Tenth St. campus, but not the specific area of the four burglarized cars, he said.
“They were just in the farthest spaces,” he said.
Still, Gilroy high staff reviewed the footage from the parking lot that day – information from each of the security cameras is stored digitally, as well as viewed live by discipline office staff.
“We looked and we looked and we looked – we sure looked at those tapes,” Corzo said.
Principal Bob Bravo said there are no plans to modify the set-up of the school’s 10 security cameras.
“I think it will just take more physical presence in the parking lot,” he said.
Currently, one campus supervisor is stationed at the entrance gate to the student parking lot, and another occasionally patrols the area, Corzo said. But supervisors need their breaks, too, and must take them while students are in class.
“Sometimes, when the kids are in the classroom, we only have four campus supervisors,” he said.
The additional supervisor will mean one more body is roaming the campus at any given time. He joins GHS already familiar with the campus, having been one of two supervisors with a security firm hired by the school to help direct traffic.