School district administrators were not satisfied with the way the V-International security team was performing at Belleville High School, so on Friday the firm was fired.
School Supt. Tom Riutta said Tuesday that they are in the process of interviewing the second-highest bidder for the job, Strategic Protection Group of Oak Park.
Supt. Riutta said V-International of Detroit was let go on Friday and came back on Monday to see if things could be worked out. They couldn’t.
“We were very unhappy with their service,” Supt. Riutta said on Tuesday, citing several incidents. He said a security guard was involved in a wrestling match with a student and a special education student hit a guard and started a confrontation.
Supt. Riutta said he was not free to discuss yet another incident.
“They are all out of Detroit and they were treating our students like they treated students in Detroit,” said Riutta.
The Belleville Police Department’s School Resource Officer, Cpl. Kris Faull, said the BHS students have been behaving great as they celebrated Spirit Week leading up to Homecoming last week and this week they are working to get named Channel 4’s Friday Football Frenzy of the Week on Oct. 22.
BHS will learn on Thursday (today) whether they won and so enthusiasm is building. If they win, BHS will hold a pep rally around 5:45 a.m. to be on television at 6 a.m., Cpl. Faull said.
Because of budget cuts, Cpl. Faull is the only school resource officer at BHS. She was assisted by school staff and Belleville Reserve officers after the security team left.