The Get in Gear contest will reward students, faculty and staff for registering their bicycles with the ASU Police Department. Participants will receive a sticker so that police are able to track bikes back to their owners and aid the recovery process, said Wendy Craft, communications specialist for ASU Business and Finance.
“Theft is the number one crime on campus and bike theft accounts for about one-third of these crimes,” said ASU Crime Prevention police officer Brian Kiefling. “There were 539 bike thefts last year and that is just what was reported.”
Since the beginning of this year, seven people have been arrested for bike theft, Kiefling said. All of the stolen bikes were returned to their owners.
Kiefling hopes that the contest will be a way for students to be more aware of bike theft. He added that most thieves are not students but are coming on campus to steal bikes.
People who registered bicycles after Nov. 13, 2012 are still eligible for prizes including ASU merchandise, gift cards for Sun Devil Campus Stores and bicycle safety kits. Two winners will be selected every week and one grand prize winner will be chosen to receive a personal technology device, Craft said.
“Last semester’s grand prize was an iPod Nano,” Craft said. “We hope that this is an incentive to raise bicycle safety awareness on campus.”
Approximately 8,000 students have registered since the bicycle registration process began a year and a half ago, Kiefling said. The ASU Police Department sets up tables and pop-up tents several times per month at campus malls where students can register their bicycles.
“Students can register anywhere with a computer,” he said. “We are trying to make it as convenient for them as possible.”
Kiefling said more students are reporting stolen bikes than in the past, which is good because it means students are taking action. Registering a bike and reporting it when stolen has caught thieves who repeatedly steal.
“We are arresting the same people continually because the penalty for stealing bikes is not strict enough,” said Kiefling, who explained the value of a bike is not enough to make stealing one a felony. “The arrest of just one person this semester has made thefts go down by 15 percent.”
In the previous fall contest, 1,664 members of the ASU community registered their bicycles with the ASU Police Department, according to ASU Business and Finance.
ASU Business and Finance has promoted the contest through social media, banners in campus dining halls and libraries, and fliers in new student orientation bags. Yet, many students are not aware they can register their bike.
Computer information systems freshman Aaron Hill said his unregistered cruiser was stolen last semester on the Tempe campus. However, he said the incentives are not significant enough for him to register.
“When you lose your bike, few people ever get it back,” Hill said. “I have a U-lock now and it’s much harder to break into.”
Journalism senior Travis McKnight said that he reported his stolen bike two years ago and his bike was never retrieved.
“If it becomes a more efficient system it will be a worthwhile process, but until then I won’t register my bike,” McKnight said.
However, Kiefling said that ASU Police are searching craigslist and pawn shops and using the serial numbers to find stolen bikes. Students who register their bikes have “exponentially increased the odds of getting them back.”
ASU Police plan to have a bike co-op and registration tables selling U-shaped bike locks next month in areas with large sets of bike racks, such as the west side of Hassayampa Academic Village on the Tempe campus. They suggest that all students use a U-shaped bike lock to secure their bike, or two locks to be safe.
Currently, ASU Police is investing in technology and taking measures to set up “bait bikes” in highly concentrated areas on campus that are purposely not locked up and easy to steal. Police are then able to track thieves on a GPS system, with the hope of finding the storage area for multiple stolen bikes.
“I’d rather find the nest than get the individual bees,” Kiefling said.
Journalism junior Demetrius Burns, a victim of bicycle theft, said he was more apt to register his bicycle after hearing about the program incentives.
“Bikes are some students’ only mode of transportation,” Burns said. “ASU should be doing whatever they can to make students safe.”
Contact the reporter at nbarret1@asu.edu
