Music promoter Terra Walker didn’t have to think twice when someone asked her to help put together a benefit performance after the Sept. 27 shooting at Platte Canyon High School.
But when she called the district office to ask how they’d like to use the money, the answer surprised her.
“I didn’t anticipate ‘security cameras,”‘ Walker said.
But like many districts juggling budget constraints and state-imposed pressures for student achievement, the Bailey high school has struggled to find money for school safety – in its particular case, to install interior video cameras.
Federal money has dwindled for grants that help local law enforcement agencies put school resource officers in hallways. Districts try to balance resources between prevention and intervention. And Colorado’s spending on public schools still ranks in the bottom half nationally.
“I’m looking at a situation where the money we get has not increased a lot over the years compared to inflation,” said Columbine High School principal Frank DeAngelis, whose school received generous security funding immediately after its 1999 tragedy.
“When the price of textbooks increases, tough decisions have to be made. There’s only so much in the pot,” he said.
In Englewood, axing a $125,000 private security contract this year allowed a district with shrinking enrollment to keep two teachers. Existing staff now patrols the hallways.
But after an extraordinary spasm of violence claimed seven victims recently in Colorado, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania schools, Englewood’s board may dip into reserves to install security cameras at two high schools and a middle school.
“It takes a tragedy”
In Denver, Lake Middle School for the first time will take advantage of its location near Invesco Field at Mile High to let Broncos fans park their cars in the school lot for $15 each, starting with Monday night’s game.
The prospective payoff: more security cameras.
“We have numerous cameras inside, and a couple outside,” said principal Hans Kayser, who hopes that with teacher, parent and student involvement, the parking venture could raise as much as $4,000 by season’s end. “But we thought that would be a good place to invest extra resources.”
Denver Public Schools security chief Ed Ray noted that “after Columbine, money flowed like water” for school safety. More recently, he has heard his counterparts in other districts talk about layoffs and cutbacks born of academic imperatives.
Although he has seen his $3.3 million annual budget slashed by roughly $1 million over the past three years, he attributes it to reductions across all departments.
“I’ve not been denied something I thought critical to maintaining my program,” he said.
Two massive federal grants helped set up a districtwide emergency response system and a local bond issue earmarked more than $4 million for security upgrades, Ray said.
But overall budget cuts left DPS with fewer security people, although Denver police have maintained staffing levels for school resource officers.
“We need to keep buildings operational, safe and secure, but at the same time provide quality education,” Ray said. “They’re not conflicting issues, but it takes a tragedy to put the security side back on the front burner.”
Other areas hog funds
Administrators and school finance experts agree that Colorado’s emphasis on student achievement in recent years – and the serious consequences that await schools that don’t measure up – necessarily tilts the budget in that direction.
“What you test is what you’ll likely emphasize,” said Joe Sleeper, executive director of operations for the Boulder Valley School District. “But I have the feeling, given what we’re seeing now in Wisconsin, in Bailey and in the Pennsylvania shootings, you’ll hear the school safety stuff come up again. And with that comes an increase in resources. Those things ebb and flow.”
In recent years, resources for school safety have largely ebbed.
Cutbacks among law enforcement agencies whose federal funds have run out means fewer school resource officers in some areas of Boulder County, Sleeper said.
In Boulder, staffing has only in the last year allowed a return to five police officers to cover nine schools. There had been only three to do the job.
“It’s still not an optimal level,” said Boulder police Sgt. Carey Weinheimer, who oversees the school resource officers.
Although differing district budget practices make it difficult to pin precise numbers on the problems, safety experts and administrators say tallies of federal money provide at least one hard indicator of diminishing resources. And federal funding for Safe/Drug-Free Schools has dropped in almost every Colorado district.
Platte Canyon, for instance, has seen a 52 percent drop in already meager funding over the last four years. The district received $2,970 for 2006-07.
“It’s shrinking, so districts may have to make up more out of their general fund, and those dollars are tight,” said Janelle Krueger, who works on safe- school-related issues for the state Department of Education.
Federal grants drying up
The U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Community Oriented Policing Services doled out about $10 million in grants to help fund 82 school resource officers in Colorado schools from 1999 through 2005.
But that well has run dry.
The COPS budget for putting officers in schools started with a $180 million annual commitment from 2000 to 2002. Last year it limped in at $5 million.
The agency’s Secure Our Schools program, which funds grants aimed primarily at security hardware and training, has maintained a relatively stable funding level of around $15 million annually. But resources are stretched thin.
“We receive far more applications than we’re able to fund,” said Gilbert Moore, a COPS spokesman. “That’s traditionally been the case. Demand has outpaced supply.”
Two Colorado districts got lucky last month.
Cañon City scored a $90,275 Secure Our Schools grant that it will use to double the scope of its existing plan for installing security cameras. Instead of covering just the high school, the sudden windfall will let the district put similar hardware in two middle schools as well.
But as the district’s grant money for school resource officers expires, Superintendent Robin Gooldy finds himself scrambling to fill that void. In rough salary terms, he said, one school resource officer equals one teacher – and that pinches the academic side of the ledger.
“If we wanted to add enrichment like advanced placement classes, it would be much more difficult to do that,” Gooldy said. “We’ll be able to continue our regular academic program, but for a district like ours, it’s difficult to offer anything extra.”
Summit County schools benefited from a $122,876 Secure Our Schools grant that will help fund an enhanced communications system as well as pay for more surveillance cameras. But the schools still depend on low-cost measures, like parents volunteering in an ambassador program, to monitor school grounds.
“For the last three or four days, parents have voluntarily come in and monitored action at our doorways,” said Superintendent Millie Hamner. “I think parents now realize we’re living in a different kind of world.”
Staff writer Kevin Simpson can be reached at 303-954-1739 or ksimpson@denverpost.com.
A statewide crunch
Federal funding for Safe/Drug-Free Schools has declined since 2003-04 for almost every Colorado school district. Here are some of the decreases:
- Platte Canyon 52.0%
- Littleton 44.2%
- Jefferson County 30.1%
- Denver 19.2%
- Statewide 25.2%
Source: Colorado Department of Education
