Providing Safety Services

We work hard to make our neighborhood a safe place to live, work, learn and more. In the past year, UCD conducted 4,630 walking escorts, 712 vehicle lock-outs, jumpstarts, and successfully connected 105 homeless individuals to assistance.  Officers are out on the streets from 8am-3am, 7 days a week, while individual services start at 10am. They keep the street safe in cooperation with the Philadelphia, Amtrak, SEPTA, Penn and Drexel Police departments, and security forces from Drexel University and St. Joseph’s University – University City Campus.

Uniformed in black and yellow, Public Safety Ambassadors are unarmed officers equipped with two-way radios that are routed through a central dispatch system. Each Public Safety Ambassador’s public safety training includes: crime prevention; emergency first aid and CPR; interpersonal relation; customer service; city services; and University City and Philadelphia history, attractions and amenities. Their services include walking escorts, vehicular services (assistance with jumpstarts and lock-outs), homeless outreach as well as tracking public hazards such as potholes, problem street signs and blocked sewers.

For more information, view our Clean and Safe booklet below, or download a PDF.