No "one size fits all" solution to school safety

The White House has come up with some ideas to keep our children safe in our public schools. They are: Establishes a Federal Commission on School Safety

Calls on Congress to pass Cornyn-Murphy bill to fix NICS

Provide firearm training to some personnel

Integrate mental health in primary care

Conduct full audit and review of FBI tipline

Betsy DeVos is the cabinet officer charged with Chairing the new Commission. She says the President wants to see Congress act on the several bills pending now. She says there is not going to be a "one size fits all" solution. She wants to look at best practices across the country.

Fox N Friends reports this morning that New York City schools will have an unarmed school safety agent in each school, but armed police officers will no longer be assigned. Instead, patrol officers will visit the schools as part of their daily patrol responsibilities.

One more cover up

Guess how many threats by students have been investigated in Colorado's five largest school districts so far this year. 400. Guess how many of those were deemed "the highest level of concern." 40. So, how about Karl Pierson the recent killer at Arapahoe High School who made a threat in September against the debate coach. Was that threat considered "the highest level of concern?" Arapahoe High School administrators won't say. Why won't they? Who is covering for whom? They won't even release threat numbers to the Denver Post, although all their neighboring districts have done so. Law enforcement is also silent. To me, it smells like one more cover up.

Zahira Torres of the Denver Post is on the story. She writes,

Earlier this year, the federal government released guidelines intended to limit strict school discipline policies that may disproportionately push minority students into the criminal justice system.

That would be our friends Eric Holder and Barack Obama, once again.

Torres writes an excellent piece here about the threat assessment process and its history. I am glad a reporter is on the case. One of the security guards at Arapahoe is blowing the whistle on the bureaucrats who run the school.

Who is politically hijacking school safety?

Kevin Simpson and Zahira Torres write in today's Denver Post that school safety has been politically hijacked. That is certainly true here in Colorado. Democrats, funded by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, George Soros, and other wealthy patrons, have made gun control one of the major planks in their platform. Conservatives and libertarians have stood up for Second Amendment rights.

Of course, the way the Post writers frame it, the ones who are politically hijacking the issue are the people who are calling for more security equipment like surveillance cameras, entrance buzzers, and metal detectors. Not even mentioned in the article are the issues of adding more police (Arapahoe High School has 2100 students and only one Deputy Sheriff Resource Officer) and allowing school employees to conceal carry.

Lots of questions, few answers

I imagine that almost everybody in Colorado is turning to the Denver Post this morning to learn more about the shooting yesterday at Arapahoe High School. I am one of those who is curious to know more about the shooter and his family.

The Post reporters begin their coverage of the shooter and his family in paragraph four. The first thing they tell us about the family is that "the family attended Bible study meetings." Oh, that explains why their son brought a shotgun to school to try to kill the debate coach/librarian. Another one of those dangerous Christian fundamentalists!

At the end of that paragraph we learn that police searched his mother's home in Highlands Ranch and also his father's home in Denver. Oh, the parents did not live together in the same home. Might that be as significant as the fact that "the family" attended Bible study meetings?

In paragraph six gun control Governor Hickenlooper said, "This has got to stop." In paragraph seven we learn that the school is quite large, with over 2100 students. How many "resource" officers patrol the building? We learn the answer to that question in paragraph twelve: one.

Was one resource officer enough to stop the 18-year-old from brazenly walking into the building with a shotgun and asking where is the teacher he wanted to kill? No. Did any of the teachers have concealed carry licenses? The reporters do not ask that question.

No doubt we will learn more in the days to come.