FROM MOUNTAIN MEDIA
RE-SENDING WITH MINOR FIXES IN FINAL PARAGRAPH
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE DATED APRIL 11, 2001
THE LIBERTARIAN, By Vin Suprynowicz
School crisis plans need to emphasize local input
As the second anniversary of the murder of 12 students and a teacher at
Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo. draws near, the Nevada state
Legislature is considering a bill intended to make sure local schools have
a response plan in place to deal with similar crises, should one ever occur
here.
Senate Bill 289 -- introduced on behalf of the state Commission on School
Safety and Juvenile Violence -- is intended to make sure school districts
have contingency plans in place to deal with a wide range of potential
emergencies, whether they arise on school buses, during off-site
activities, or on the school campuse themselves.
In a recent FBI report on the subject, Supervisory Special Agent Mary
Ellen O'Toole wrote that "In today's climate, some schools tend to adopt a
one-size-fits-all approach to any mention of violence," but that it's far
better to be prepared to respond flexibly to the wide range of threats that
can occur.
"We were focused on keeping the decision-making as local as we could,
because these are local concerns and the people who are closest to the
issues should be the ones making the decisions," agrees state Sen. Valerie
Wiener, D-Las Vegas, who chaired the state School Safety commission.
Unfortunately, it's not at all clear that's what will really end up
happening, as SB 289 is currently drafted.
Yes, the bill requires local schools to create site committees with the
power to "suggest" deviations from the district-wide master plan. But any
such deviations must be approved by the school district's central
committee.
And while the bill stipulates that the "local law enforcement agency"
will be involved in such contingency planning, Ms. Wiener makes it clear
that term is meant to refer to "primary police agencies" like the Las Vegas
Metropolitan Police, rather than the district school police.
"We have no voice here and we're the pulse of that school," protests Phil
Gervasi, president of the Police Officers Association for the Clark County
School District Police Department.
Furthermore, the current bill would exempt drafters of such crisis plans
from the state open meeting law, meaningthe very folks who would be
expected to eventually put such plans into effect, and who would thus be
most likely to spot flaws (local school police or custodians, for instance)
will be shut out of the process.
Ms. Wiener replies that the emergency plans must be kept secret lest some
perpetrator get hold of the emergency plan and "work around the plan."
But our schools are not armed military compounds, designed to withstand
penetration by professional special forces -- and let's hope they never
are. Teachers, parents, ad school trustees will take part in compiling
these plans, which will then have to be widely circulated to staff,
discussed, and even acted out in practice drills. Would the airlines keep
secret from their passengers the procedures for evacuating an aircraft, in
hopes of keeping potential hijackers from figuring out where the doors are?
In addition to this excess of secrecy, the flaw in the kind of emergency
planning envisioned in SB 289 is precisely its top-down nature. The path of
lest resistance will be to generate nearly identical plans for schools of
different sizes and with different floorplans -- schools with or without
windows or isolated classrooms, schools filled with seven-year-olds or with
17-year-olds.
The emphasis should be shifted to give the main authority to each local
school, subject only to general, overall guidance from the district. Local
employees and particularly local school police -- familiar with each
building's layout, problems and population -- should play far more
substantial roles.
Local principals might even be encouraged to consider the violence
prevention/cessation measure which has proved most effective in places like
Pearl, Miss., as well as in a locale where school violence used to be most
prevalent and tragic: Israel.
Responsible, trained Israeli teachers and parent volunteers reduced
violence practically to zero in that embattled nation when they began to go
armed. The Legislature should make it clear in SB 289 that school
principals are free to encourage willing teachers to apply for and use
state concealed weapon permits, if they so desire.
Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas
Review-Journal. Subscribe to his monthly newsletter by sending $72 to
Privacy Alert, 1475 Terminal Way, Suite E for Easy, Reno, NV 89502. His
book, "Send in the Waco Killers: Essays on the Freedom Movement,
1993-1998," is available at 1-800-244-2224, or via web site
www.thespiritof76.com/wacokillers.html
***
Vin Suprynowicz, vin@lvrj.com
"When great changes occur in history, when great principles are involved,
as a rule the majority are wrong. The minority are right." -- Eugene V.
Debs (1855-1926)
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed -- and
thus clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with an endless series
of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." -- H.L. Mencken
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