LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- The Jefferson County Board of Education created and funded new school security positions Thursday.
The board passed a nearly $7.3 million projected budget for the program and approved new job descriptions and organizational charts for school security administrators and officers on a unanimous vote during a special meeting Thursday.
About $6.5 million of the project's budget has been earmarked for salaries and benefits for 66 school safety administrators, 15 school safety officers, 15 reclassified school security monitors and five district security officers. The project budget only includes pay increases for school security monitors and district security officers, not their full salaries.
Corrie Shull, the board's vice chairman who represents District 6, called the plan to assign school safety officers to schools in close proximity and hire safety administrators in many schools a "very innovative compromise."
"I think it's something that everyone can support, something that will keep our buildings safe and something that will not contribute to the school-to-prison pipeline," he said.
JCPS has been without school resource officers since before the 2019-20 school year, when Louisville Metro pulled 17 LMPD officers from the district’s SRO program in response to budget cuts and a split school board did not approve contracts with other local law enforcement agencies for 11 officers.
The district’s plan calls for the assignment of school safety administrators, who will earn $74,514 annually, to every middle and high school and two to every assistant superintendent at the elementary level. Those working in middle and high schools would report to principals.
The Academy @ Shawnee, Marion C. Moore School, Iroquois High, Doss High, Valley High, Stuart Academy and Robert Frost Sixth-Grade Academy are among 12 schools slated for two safety administrators each under the district’s plan either because they have combined middle and high schools or because they have been identified as maximum-need schools, according to board documents.
School safety administrators would work in schools to build positive climates; foster trusting relationships with students, employees and other stakeholders; and handle school safety matters like threat assessments and threat monitoring, according to a presentation for Thursday's meeting.
The district’s plan also calls for a team of armed school safety officers to cover schools within certain geographic zones based primarily around middle and high schools. Most assignments will include between three and seven schools, and three alternative schools – Breckinridge Metropolitan High, Minor Daniels Academy and Waller-Williams Environmental – would have their own dedicated safety officer, according to the plan.
JCPS Superintendent Marty Pollio said after Thursday's vote that hiring for the newly created positions would begin shortly. He hoped to have school safety administrators in place by the start of the 2022-23 school year and school security officers enrolled in state law enforcement training as soon as possible.
"We'll begin that as soon as we have people trained and ready to go with the proper certifications and equipment," he said.
Talks of creating an internal security team at JCPS rekindled in recent months after the COVID-19 pandemic sidelined previous meetings on the divisive subject. The only attendees at Thursday’s meeting were Jefferson County Teachers Association President Brent McKim, JCPS employees, hired security officers and members of the news media.
Pollio said the district has sought public input on the security proposal and gotten little resistance in response.
"We haven't quite seen it," Pollio said. "I think it's a good plan that really adds safety and security in our district."
The potential assignment of safety officers to schools in geographic zones at JCPS has drawn criticism from Rep. Kevin Bratcher, a Louisville Republican who previously told WDRB News that he hoped to tighten state law to require school resource officers to serve one school or campus on-site.
The legislation he has sponsored, House Bill 63, was on the agenda for Tuesday’s House Education Committee meeting but pulled from consideration at his request, according to the panel’s chairwoman.
Kevin Brown, general counsel for JCPS, started Thursday’s meeting by defending the legality of the district’s plan. He noted that the plan is similar to security measures in place at Fayette County Public Schools.
While she ultimately voted for the plan, board member Linda Duncan worried that officers could be "blocks away" when emergencies happen and could not interact as much with students and staff inside schools.
"This is a compromise for me, and I hope that eventually we can maybe add more and do more," said Duncan, who represents District 5. "I think officers need to be steps away from violent threat, not blocks away from violent threat."
Pollio told reporters that he understood Duncan's concern, though hiring enough officers to place one in all 155 JCPS schools would be challenging. Law enforcement agencies like Louisville Metro Police and Kentucky State Police face shortages of officers currently, he said.
"To think that we would get 155 and have them in every school I just don't see as a possibility, so I think the next best possibility for us is to put them regionally in a geographic area," he said.
Officers would have opportunities to stop at schools in their coverage areas during their patrols, Pollio said.
However, the district does not want officers "monitoring a cafeteria and performing discipline acts that an administrator should perform," he said.
Safety administrators and officers would be required to undergo 60 hours of district training every year in areas like de-escalation, restorative practices, implicit bias, safe crisis management, trauma-informed care, bullying and suicide prevention, board documents show. Officers would need another 40 hours of annual training in state-mandated programs for school resource officers and Peace Officer Professional Standards certification.
The project budget shows 15 school safety officers would be paid salaries of $55,211, and annual pay for 15 security monitors, who would be reclassified as safety officers, and five district security officers, who would not be assigned to schools, would increase by averages of $2,202 and $1,371, respectively.
Other items in the district’s budget for the security plan include $434,190 for a fleet of 15 vehicles, $89,712 for 42 body cameras, $42,336 for 42 sets of body armor, $30,744 for 42 Tasers, $22,500 for 15 two-way radios, $22,500 for insurance, $19,866 for 42 9mm handguns, $16,560 for phones and cellular service plans, and $11,805 for 15 laptop computers.
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