Twenty-seven years after Penn State University Police began carrying firearms, more Commonwealth Campuses are taking steps toward arming their officers.

Police officers at the Mont Alto campus will receive final approval to carry firearms by the end of this semester, said William Donahue, assistant director for university police at University Park.

Approval of a department's request to carry firearms is left to the discretion of police officials at University Park, Donahue said. Officials also have the option of denying a department's request if they have not demonstrated a need for firearms.

Because officers at the Mont Alto campus rely on state police for backup, the department could handle emergency situations better if officers are armed, Mont Alto Police Supervisor James Sourbier said. "If you need their response, they may be five minutes away," he said. "On the other hand, they may be a half-hour away."

The Mont Alto campus is one of several other Penn State Commonwealth Campus police departments that have considered taking this step, Donahue said.

Police departments at Altoona, Harrisburg, Erie and Berks campuses are currently authorized to issue firearms to officers. Beaver, McKeesport, Hazleton and Schuylkill campus police departments are in the preliminary stages of the process, Donahue said.

In 1978, officers at University Park were the first to be authorized to carry firearms, Police Supervisor Tyrone Parham said.

The decision to carry firearms at University Park was the result of several incidents that put unarmed officers in danger, he said.

For example, members of the community were concerned that university police would not effectively control a local Teamsters union strike without access to firearms, he said.

"[The community] did not feel that we could provide the appropriate coverage," Parham said.

Only officers with a bachelor's degree and previous experience are authorized to carry firearms, Sourbier said.

For two years, the Mont Alto department has worked to hire qualified personnel in order to arm its officers, Sourbier said.

Once a department has been approved, the cost for equipment and training is about $1,500 per officer, Donahue said.

The decision to arm Mont Alto's police officers did not result from a single incident, Sourbier said, but was, instead, a gradual change.

University police at the Beaver campus have not formally decided to become an armed department, though some steps have been taken in the process, Supervisor Ronald Schwartz said. "We have just completed upgrading the department personnel," he said. "That may be something that we look at in the near future."

The effort to arm the McKeesport campus police department has been spearheaded by the student government, Chief Glen Reid said.

"This was something that they had had a concern about for a couple years," he said.

Although Penn State Altoona's police department has been armed since the 1980s, officers are still limited to carrying only a pistol because of their small campus size, said Delmar Woodring, manager of Police and Safety at the Altoona campus.

Officers at University Park are also authorized to carry shotguns and long guns, Woodring said. "There's nothing to differentiate us from a normal police agency," he said. "We're at risk based upon the very nature of our job and our uniform."