More prevalent than the swine flu, more costly than parking tickets and more traumatizing than game day vomit, theft has been the biggest problem at several universities for years.

The police departments of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, University of Mississippi, University of Florida at Gainesville, and University of Georgia all list theft as the number one problem on their campuses.

“The top five crimes would be theft, theft, theft, theft and theft,” said UF Police Captain Jeff Holcomb. “All crimes are our concern, but that’s what we’ve dealt with.”

UGA Police Chief Jimmy Williamson said his department fights thefts by educating students and

faculty.

“Our biggest deterrence to crime is getting students, faculty and staff to think crime can happen here,” he said. “[As] with everything in crime prevention, it’s a partnership between police and the community.”

Randy Young, information specialist for the UNC Department of Public Safety, said education is also his university’s main theft defense.

“We have a dedicated community response unit on campus that really tries to work with student groups and get out and be more visible than some of the other patrols,” he said. “We do presentations to incoming freshmen. From the first day they step on campus they’re hit with the message.”

Young said his department takes a variety of steps to deter thefts, including confiscating unattended property and leaving a note for students to retrieve their items.

There were 427 reported larcenies in 2007 and 319 in 2008, he said.

Holcomb said at UF, his department teaches a “crime prevention triangle.”

“There’s opportunity, desire and ability,” Holcomb said.

Criminals have the ability and desire to commit theft, but “by taking [opportunity] out of the chain, they can’t commit the theft,” he said.

Holcomb said his department uses fliers to remind students to be on the lookout for suspicious activity.

“Oftentimes the criminals will stand out if the students are looking for it,” he said. “We’ve got 50,000 students. When you look at the total number, including visitors to campus, [our population] can easily reach 80,000 a day. If theft’s our biggest crime, that’s not too bad.”

University of Mississippi Assistant Police Chief Ray Hawkins said his department sees thefts rise at the beginning and end of semesters, when students are more likely to be out buying books or studying.

At Mississippi, Hawkins said officers patrol hot crime areas on foot and put up fliers reminding students to secure valuables.

Williamson said education isn’t the only way UGA Police try to prevent thefts. Officers are always on uniformed patrols, and when certain types of thefts arise, his department tries to get creative, he said.

“For car break-ins we rent cars and put bait cars out there,” he said.

By leaving attractive items such as laptops in the cars, Williamson said criminals are tempted to break in, and, when they do, they’re arrested.

Although thefts are the most common problem seen at these universities, violent crime is consistently the biggest concern.

“Shootings, stabbings – those are our biggest fears,” Williamson said. “Those are something we think about daily. We train on those topics fairly frequently.”

Williamson said underage drinking has also been a concern on campus – with 313 arrests in 2008 – but not a huge one.

“We’re not hiding in our efforts to catch them,” he said. “What we typically do is see some action that would catch anybody’s attention. We find a lot of students report other students for their behavior.”

Although the UF Police had 264 liquor law violation arrests in 2008, Holcomb said his department rarely sees underage drinking on campus except on football game days.

Since UF passed stricter regulations on events such as fraternity and sorority parties, underage drinking has dropped off, he said.

“I don’t know if it’s because of the houses – if Greek members decided to make those changes themselves – or if it was University regulations,’ Holcomb said.

Hawkins said, at Mississippi, most bars are about half a mile from campus, so his department doesn’t see many alcohol-related arrests.

“Alcohol is a concern,’ he said. “It’s something that’s addressed, but for our campus we really don’t encounter a lot of alcohol.”

Young said UNC Police, whose jurisdiction ends at campus boundaries, tend to leave underage possession arrests to Chapel Hill police.

“We don’t look at that as a law enforcement aspect, we look at that as a medical aspect,” Young said. “We prefer to see to their safety first and foremost.”