Tuesday, February 13, 2007

What about those tasers, board members say.

After getting tons of phone calls from constituents, school board members, in particular Kevass Harding, who is also a candidate for the at-large race, and Shirely Jefferson, asked for an update on the city and district's talks about the memorandum of understanding. The document not only outlines which entity pays for when it comes to school resource officers but it also outlines a continuum of force that tells officers when to use Tasers.

The discussion on Taser use in schools became a fire storm last year when a 15 year-old special education student at North became the first to be stunned.

That prompted groups like Hope Street Youth Development, an organization that promotes leadership among children, to ask for more studies to be done on Tasers and a board policy to regulate them.
Board member Lynn Rogers voiced his opinion Monday night against a policy on Tasers saying that it wasn't the school boards place to tell the officers what to do.

The information asked by Harding and Jefferson could be available as early as the Feb. 26 meeting. Included in those requests are the number of times that Tasers have been used in schools.

Oh and those constituents who called the board members? Students from Hope Street as part of a campaign to bring attention to the issue.

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