University of Hawai'i-Manoa officials plan to spend about $1.4 million on added security measures over the next two years in the wake of two assaults during the spring that heightened safety concerns on campus.

It is all part of a commitment by UH interim President David McClain to spend 5 percent of all new money on increased security throughout the 10 campuses in the UH system.

"UH will be — must be — a rape-free zone," McClain said at a news conference yesterday.

On the UH-Manoa campus, two projects are under way to create a safer environment — enhanced lighting and landscape improvements, said Kathy Cutshaw, vice chancellor for administration, finance and operations.

Cutshaw said more security guards also are being requested for next year, but she isn't sure the request will be financed. Campus security force staffing — 30 guards — has not changed for more than a dozen years, said Jim Manke, UH-Manoa spokesman.

But while more guards aren't expected this year, McClain said, the university is proposing legislation to give guards arrest authority — essentially creating a campus police force. McClain said 12 schools on the Mainland of a similar size to UH-Manoa authorize officers to make arrests.

Campus police would work in conjunction with the state attorney general's office, the state sheriff's office and the Honolulu Police Department, McClain said. If the UH Board of Regents approves the proposal, it will be forwarded to the Legislature.

UH-Manoa student Elyssa Rosso, 20, said security on campus is "lacking" and the new spending can only help.

"It is something you are forced to think about, especially when you hear about there being a rape or kidnapping," said Rosso, who lived on campus last year but moved home to Kane'ohe this year.

She said McClain "seems to be taking a very strong approach to making female students feel a lot safer."

The Associated Students of the University of Hawai'i has said there have been at least 17 sexual assaults involving UH-Manoa students in the past three years.

On March 28, an 18-year-old woman was abducted by five men while she was walking on Sea View Avenue, just across from UH-Manoa. She was sexually assaulted at a nearby park, police said.

And on June 16, a man attempted to abduct a woman while she walked to her UH-Manoa summer-school class. The attempted abduction occurred on Kamehameha Avenue near College Hill.

Kathryn Xian, executive director of Girl Fest Hawai'i, said she hopes the new money will be spent in the right places. Her organization has requested new locks on the doors at the dormitory and new lighting fixtures in dark areas.

"I'd like to see the money spent to reduce assaults, not property crime," Xian said.

On campus, new lights are being installed around the Marine Science building, the Hawai'i Institute of Geophysics building and the Pacific Ocean Science and Technology building, as well as around Moore Hall, Snyder Hall and Edmondson Hall, Cutshaw said.

Shrubs around dark areas on campus also are being cut down to enhance visibility, she said.

Other expenditures planned over the 2006 and 2007 fiscal years include installation of security cameras and magnetic card-swipe locks.

Xian applauded McClain for reaffirming UH as a "rape-free zone," which he declared last spring. "It needed to be said again. Sometimes it's said once and forgotten," she said.

University officials also are drafting a system-wide sexual assault policy in accordance with the Cleary Act — a federal mandate for the handling of sexual assault cases.

Susan Hippensteele, director of women's studies at UH-Manoa and member of the Rape Free Zone Coalition, has participated in drafting the policy and said she wants the university to take a strong stance in the policy's wording.

"Our position is that the minimum requirements of the Cleary Act are just that," she said. "The university can do more and should do more."

However, Hippensteele added that McClain is taking "the most proactive approach" she's seen of any university administration during the 20 years she's been there. "It's unprecedented," she said.

Reach Loren Moreno at lmoreno@honoluluadvertiser.com.