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03/16/2018 09:52 AMOn Dec. 14, 2012, the Sandy Hook school shooting claimed 26 lives in Newton, and North Branford Public Schools put a plan in motion to hire retired police, carrying guns, as armed School Security Officers (SSO). Over five years later, the armed officers continue to man the town's four school buildings.
Right now, other school districts across the state and the nation are urgently grappling with community calls to ramp up school security, including arming guards, following the horrific Feb. 14 school shooting which claimed 17 lives at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, FL.
"The day of Sandy Hook, we had a police presence in every school building. It's never left, since that day," said Superintendent of Schools Scott Schoonmaker, in an exclusive interview with Zip06/The Sound this week.
In North Branford, bringing in armed guards was a process. But the district, Town Council and police department embraced the challenge and answered the call – and questions -- of citizens. The school district paid overtime police costs to keep a police presence at every school building in the approximate one months' time it took to hire and place the SSO's.
By late January 2013, with North Branford's school district acting as its own security agency, six retired officers were hired; selected from a pool of 55 applicants. Together with one retired police officer already on the job as an SSO, North Branford schools now had a compliment of seven SSO's on the job. Beginning in February 2013, the seven SSO's began covering five full-time and two part-time posts in North Branford's four public school buildings, including its two elementary schools, the intermediate school and high school. The town budgeted $135,000 for the program that year.
The SSO's began working without weapons as it took several more months for the town, school district and police leadership to work out the best approach for arming, training and certifying the SSO's to carry in the schools. During that period of time, SSO's carried radios with direct police contact and became a visible presence at the schools.
Meanwhile, North Branford sought legal guidance and checked in with entities including the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and CT State Police. The town drafted protocol for legal ownership of the weapons, locking up SSO guns at police headquarters, and SSO training with the police force. See past stories on the process here , here and here
By September 2013, with all issues ironed out, every SSO began carrying a .40 caliber Glock handgun at each of North Branford's public school buildings.
"We came together as a community with law enforcement and our Board of Ed and our Town Council, and decided that we were going to put [in place] our retired police officers being charged with protecting our schools; and they do carry a weapon they do carry a police radio and they train with our police force. And we've had it since that day," said Schoonmaker.
Asked if he feels having armed SSO's in the town's schools gives the community more peace of mind, Schoonmaker answered, "I think 100 percent it does; and I always go on and say that there's no guarantees for anything. But I know that until someone gives me a better course of action than what we're doing, we're staying put with what we believe and what we feel is in the best interest of all of our schools."