During the week of Jan. 24 to Jan. 30, no crimes were reported to the Sacramento State Police Department.

In the first week of spring semester last year, The State Hornet reported seven crimes were reported to the Sac State Police, ranging from a DUI to burglary. 

This marks the first week in 2021 that no crimes were reported on campus.

The large difference in crime reports can be attributed to COVID-19 and the campus being closed, according to Sac State Police Chief Mark Iwasa. 

Iwasa said it is “not super common” for no crimes to be reported to the department in a week.

“These last several months or the last 6 to 8 months with the campus being empty, the number of crimes has dropped dramatically,” Iwasa said.

Iwasa said officers still patrol campus during their shifts when there are no crimes being reported to the department.

“They visit all of the higher incident areas like the parking structures, parking lots, mess halls, so they basically patrol those areas,” Iwasa said.

Iwasa said that the minimum of patrol officers working at any given time is two, with the maximum being four if more people are on campus. 

The police department typically operates on a budget of over $6 million, which remained the same for both the 2018-2019 and 2019-2020 fiscal years, according to an article by The State Hornet. In the 2020-2021 fiscal year, however, the budget of the police department was expected to be reduced by approximately $300,000 due to Sac State having to compensate for a $7 million deficit.

Iwasa said the department’s operations have still remained the same despite the budget cut, with the department receiving regular calls from people reporting crime.

Iwasa was unable to provide the exact number for this year’s budget but said it has been affected due to COVID-19.

“That’s already been determined that we’re going to have reduced revenues. A lot of it comes from reduction in the auxiliaries. Auxiliaries took a pretty big hit because of the inability to rent the residence halls,” Iwasa said. “Reduction of revenues coming in, part of our budget is contingent on that.”