My fellow students:

On Thursday, the Oracle ran a story to discuss changes in SAFE Team’s management and administration. SAFE Team is a service that Student Government provides to the student body to ensure students feel a higher level of safety when traversing the campus at night. In the article, I was interviewed and quoted by the Oracle correspondent and stated several issues I have observed during my three-year tenure in SG related to SAFE Team. I believe the context of my quotes misrepresented the rational for the shift in administration and SAFE Team as a whole.

While there have been incidents within the agency, I feel as though I had no ground to overstate their severity, and I admit that I did not take into account the impact my statements would have on SAFE Team’s credibility and reputation on campus. Specifically, I am referring to the incident of alleged distribution or use of drugs by previous SAFE Team employees. Neither of these issues has been confirmed, and they were nothing more than unconfirmed rumors within Student Government.

SAFE Team plays a crucial role, not only within Student Government, but within the USF campus as a whole. My intentions in the article were to highlight a positive change within SAFE Team’s administrative structure by merging with the University Police. SAFE Team and SG leadership in the past years have pushed for this change, and finally, we have the opportunity to see it come to fruition. I did not intend in any way for this article to damage the reputation of the students who give up their nights, sometimes as late as 3 a.m., to ensure that our student body is safer.

As the president of the student body, I not only apologize to the members of SAFE Team, but commend them for the work they do and their commitment to a safer USF community.

Student Body President Juan Soltero