On Monday, March 26th a suspicious man showed up in the teacher lot off of Lincoln. Caught on the security cameras, he was seen walking around the parking lot, peeking in the windows of cars and approaching a few teachers.
The man, after inspecting the cars in the parking lot, went in to the Annex, a building that shares the parking lot with Seaholm. Vicki Jansen, a staff member at the Annex, said the man walked in and used their bathroom, which is off limits to the public.
“No one saw him leave,” said Jansen. “Most of the day, most of our staff is outside with the kids. He could have walked around the whole building and no one would have noticed.”
Now, the Annex is getting a new security system that involves ID cards.
“People will need a card to enter,” said Jansen. “It’s a good idea because so many people come in to our building and we don’t know who should be there and who shouldn’t.”
Building security is a concern for administrators at both the Annex and Seaholm. Visitors who walk in to the parking lot can just as easily walk in to their buildings.
“I am more concerned about the security of our building, but it is difficult with open lunch and other activities going on all day,” said Principal Dee Lancaster.
With open lunch and teachers traveling back and forth during the day, and all the sports activities and college classes going on after school, it’s almost impossible to keep Seaholm fully secure.
Seaholm junior Catherine Dolan doesn’t see a need to increase security.
“I feel really safe at Seaholm,”said Dolan. “And it’s aggravating when the doors aren’t open.”
There are 23 separate doors at Seaholm. Out of all of them, only the doors to the front entrance and the two parking lots are open all the time.
“Safety is always a number one priority,” said Assistant Principal Stacy Peterson. “We try to lock as many doors as we can but the main entrances are always open.”
Both Lancaster and Peterson agree if a student or teacher sees someone who looks like they don’t belong there, they should come in to the office immediately and report it. They also encourage teachers to question visitors at Seaholm and ask them why they are there.
“Our newly added security cameras help solve a lot of problems. If something comes up and we need to see when and where a person was, we can,” said Peterson. “But we can’t have staff watching the cameras all the time. We can never have one hundred percent security.”
