Security changes on the way to help combat youth violence in Dayton

Police body camera footage shows dozens of teens fighting and yelling outside the main library in downtown Dayton.

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Hundreds of students from Dayton Public High Schools transfer and use RTA buses at the downtown hub between 3 and 6 p.m. That leaves many in the area around the hub or walking around the corner to the library, it’s not always a safe and peaceful process.

As News Center 7 reported at 6:00, police officers rolled up to a fight on September 12th. Police wrote in a report that 30 to 40 DPS students were involved. They found lots of screaming and at least one girl who’d been pepper-sprayed.

The scene was so bad that police along with library security officers told everyone to leave. They briefly shut the place down.

Dayton Metro Library executive director Jeffrey Trzeciak said they welcome teens but also are working to minimize problems.

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“We’ve increased our guards, we do hire our own guards now, they’re not contract workers,” Trzeciak said.

As soon as things settled down at the library on September 12th, police were called back to the RTA hub. They detained a student teen there after a smaller fight.

News Center 7 obtained Dayton Police records that show 244 calls for service to the Hub and the library this year. They don’t all involve students but a large number do.

“We were all teens at one point and I’m sure our parents were not thrilled with us 100% of the time either,” Trzeciak said.

The library’s director says they welcome teens, who are now 1/3 of their users, and he says he believes everyone is still re-establishing proper social structure after COVID shutdowns.

“Help people reconnect to the community and help to be productive,” Trzeciak said.

News Center 7 reached out to RTA leaders, who declined comment other than to say they believe this is a Dayton Public Schools issue.

Dayton Public Schools leaders told News Center 7 they are willing to speak about the issues but were not available to do so Thursday.

We will continue following this story.

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