Editorial: More school resource officers?

Belleville Police Sgt. Kris Faull is the only school resource officer assigned to the Van Buren Public Schools. She was present at the recent incident where a student brought a gun to Belleville High School. She searched and found the gun where the student hid it in a neighbor’s yard off the school grounds.
She is the one who is called when things go wrong at the middle school and other school locations. Is it time for the community to demand more school resource officers to protect their students?
The Van Buren Public Schools reimburses the city $40,000 every year for its school resource officer, which is less than half the officer’s cost to the city. There used to be two school resource officers, with one from Van Buren Township PD. Then, the need for school resource officers was reevaluated by Supt. Van Tassell.
At Monday’s three-hour budget workshop, the Belleville City Council heard City Manager/Police Chief Robinson state more school resource officers were needed in the schools because of the number of students. He said he brought that up to the VBT supervisor and the school supt. He said the schools would like DARE programs for fifth graders, but Belleville has just nine officers and can’t do it. He said the neighboring communities have more officers. Mayor Pro-Tem Voigt said they probably need one full time at the high school and one each at McBride and Owen.
“It’s in our backyard,” Mayor Kerreen Conley said of the high school. “But most are not ours.”