Area colleges mourn deaths at Virginia Tech
by DAVID F. SHERMAN Managing Editor

University at Buffalo President John B. Simpson issued a sympathetic statement Monday after hearing that 32 people were killed and more than two dozen others were injured in a shooting rampage at Virginia Tech.

(See editorial on page four)

"Colleges and universities should be - and generally are - safe havens ... places where the currency is ideas - not violence. That such a horrendous act took place at one of our nation's colleges is nearly impossible to comprehend."

It was the deadliest shooting rampage in modern U.S. history.

The massacre Monday took place almost eight years to the day after the shootings at Columbine High School near Littleton, Colo. On April 20, 1999, two teenagers killed 12 fellow students and a teacher before taking their own lives.

Monday morning at the sprawling Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University campus in Blacksburg, Va., a gunman massacred 32 people before shooting himself.

The gunman was identified Tuesday as Cho Seung-Hui, 23, a student at the university.

Wielding two handguns, the killer opened fire at about 7:15 a.m. on the fourth floor of a high-rise coed dormitory, then stormed a classroom building on the other side of the 2,600-acre campus, according to AP.

Bill Reuter, interim president of Erie Community College, said his heart and prayers go out to all the families and individuals affected by Monday's shootings.

"It's an absolute tragedy," he said. "No matter what you do and whatever security measures you have, there are going to be situations you cannot control."

Reuter said the City Campus has cameras throughout the building, a security measure that has resulted in the apprehension of the persons involved in at least two incidents in the past year. One was a bomb threat.

Installation of security cameras on the South Campus, which encompasses seven buildings, will be completed by the end of May, Reuter said. Blue light security posts will dot each parking lot.

When work there is done, cameras and security posts will be installed on the North Campus, which has eight buildings.

"We are spending a great deal of our resources to make certain everyone is safe," he said.