On August 9, the Downey City Council agreed with the Downey Unified School District (DUSD) to approve an armed police officer inside Columbus High School.
His salary will be covered in part by a grant from the Gangs Out of Downey organization and the rest by DUSD.
Although this may sound like scary news to some parents , knowing that an armed officer is walking on campus is something that has been around for over 20 years, local DUSD representatives said.
The goal of the armed officers within the three Downey District High Schools is for them to become a role model for students as they attempt to prevent crime inside campuses.
Several Columbus High School students said they have seen armed police officers walking on their campus and are not bothered at all. In fact, it makes them feel more comfortable.
Students like Nathan Lennon said that while he hasn’t personally met the armed officer on his Columbus school campus, he likes the idea that there is one.
“I go to shooting places with my family and I’m interested in weapons”, said the student. “Having grown up in my family like mine makes me feel more comfortable when someone is armed.”
He said that on one occasion he saw an armed agent at the car wash and he was very kind with him after he asked him what type of weapon he was carrying.
“He was very open on the subject, we had a good conversation and later I saw him at school,” added the teenager.
He stressed that the young people who do not like the idea of the armed agent on campus is because they are not doing things right and they fear the consequences .
Jarren Sánchez, another student from Columbus, said that he has also never personally met the armed agent at his school but likes the idea as it makes them feel calmer and safer.
Sánchez added that it is unfortunate that the issue of shootings on school campuses has normalized to the point that they must have practices in case something like this happens at their school.
“It is very scary, but knowing that there is someone with a weapon who can protect us makes us feel better,” said the student.
Assistant Superintendent of Secondary Education of the DUSD, Roger Brossmer, said that the program helps since Downey has its own police department, where the agents are hired.
He emphasized that the fact that the agents are armed not and It is a problem since the objective is to create relationships with students while preventing possible incidents of any kind
“Our approach has never been that the police issue tickets or arrest children, the relationship is about mentoring children, children seeing that police officers are just human beings doing a job and that they are there to help”, he explained
Putting the Program into Practice
Robert Jagielski is the Senior Director of Student, Safety, Wellness and Engagement at DUSD and also the person in charge of the School Resource Officers (SRO) program.
He indicated that there is an importance of having these officers on campus since that each of the three high schools has between 3,500 to 4,300 students per campus.
He said that the SRO program that started in approximately 1999 had different police officers every day. This, despite being productive, did not allow them to better understand the students they had to protect.
So they began to adopt a new model to hire an RSO officer in each of the largest high schools , Downey and Warren, and this year it will start in Columbus.
Columbus has an adult school and has a different officer every day, but they also have a security agent.
“The officers go to work with the students and enter and talk in the classrooms. They can talk about their profession, answer questions, their careers and the law since we have government classes,” explained Jagielski. “They go to different events. They become part of the school team, work with the assistant principals, work together as a team, and review safety plans to help people stay as safe as possible if necessary.”
DUSD has more than 22,000 students of which approximately 80% are of Latin roots.
Brossmer said that at least once a year they do drills to which they do not title as shootings but as drills of unauthorized intruders or emergency closures of schools (lockdowns). issue of shootings and for this reason they try to keep them informed. feel the need to have armed officers in schools, but I understand e DUSD decision.
“Meanwhile, I believe there are too many guns in our communities, and I am trying to get them out of the streets,” she stressed. “Last week we staged the second of three gun buy-back events I’ve held in towns across my district – giving residents a chance to remove dangerous guns from their homes, in exchange for gift cards.”
Additionally, Hahn is seeking to implement new reasonable gun regulations at the county level. Her bill would ban the sale of high-caliber handguns and ammunition and implement new rules for gun dealers in unincorporated areas to deny criminals access to guns.