Florida Poly unveils new safety center

Well, Florida Polytechnic is stepping into the future of campus safety. Today the university in Lakeland unveiled their brand new safety and operations center. FOX 13's Carla Byron takes us there inside the new hub The new university safety and operations center brings together police, facilities and emergency operations all under one roof. Prior to this brand new 10,000 square foot facility, police were working out of a single trailer. The university had to expand to keep up with the growing student population. There There are now about 1,100 students who live on campus and the new facilities where officers and staff will train, learn, and work to help improve their response to anything that can happen. Officers will also now receive in-person training once a week as opposed to online training. Like any other skill that people acquire throughout life, if you don't train the skill, you lose the skill. And what we do is a deteriorating, they will deteriorate if you don't train on them. So, where they had some challenges before, because of the facility that they operated out of, we don't have those limitations now. The police department also got a new explosive detection canine named Tech. Plus, they started a drone unit earlier this year, and currently there are five officers who are drone pilots, although the goal is for all officers to become certified. With the addition of this new facility, the goal is for Florida Poly to become the safest college campus in the state. In Lakeland, Carla Byron, Fox 13 News.