MILWAUKEE — Questions still remain over when and which Milwaukee Schools will receive school resource officers.
Interim Superintendent Eduardo Galvan provided the first update since February on the process. He said the preliminary work has been completed.
"These activities provided valuable insights and laid the foundation for subsequent development of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU),” said Galvan during the meeting.
WATCH: 8/29/24 - Regular Monthly Board Meeting (youtube.com)
The draft of that MOU outlines expectations for both MPS and the Milwaukee Police Department. The city attorney needs to review it and provide revisions before the document can become official.
However, negotiations over who will foot the bill for these SRO positions have not been started.
Previous Coverage: MPS working on plan for school resource officers 9 months after state deadline (tmj4.com)
Previous Coverage: High school students react to SROs returning to MPS schools (tmj4.com)
Previous Coverage: Still no timeline on adding state-mandated SROs to Milwaukee public schools (tmj4.com)
Previous Coverage: Plan for MPS school resource officers unclear as hiring deadline passes (tmj4.com)
State law mandated that Milwaukee Public Schools have 25 school resource officers in place by January 1, 2024.
It’s a part of the state legislature’s approval of ACT 12. Part of that agreement allowed Milwaukee to add a sales tax in exchange for SRO’s being put back in place.
Watch: MPS School Board Meeting attendees react to update on SRO's
That state law didn’t outline any sort of punishment for MPS missing the deadline.
MPS stopped putting officers inside schools back in 2016. It cut its contract with MPD in 2020 to have officers outside of schools.
The lack of urgency by the district was frustrating to Lauren Greuel, an attorney for the Wisconsin Institute of Law & Liberty, who was in attendance Thursday night.
“I thought that they'd be further along,” said Greuel. “I think that it's a disservice both to the schools, to the Milwaukee Police Department, and to students that they haven't already done what they were supposed to do, what they are required to do by law.”
Quinton Klabon, who works for the Institute for Reforming Government, also shared his reaction and worry over possible consequences of the district not acting quicker.
“I think it's really important for Milwaukee Public Schools to build credibility with the legislature,” said Klabon. “I can see opportunities, as was discussed tonight, talking about special education funding, perhaps reading funding, and so it's unfortunate to see deadlines come and go when it comes to the school resource officers being placed in Milwaukee Public Schools.”
The state legislature did not provide any funding for the positions.
Galvan said conversations will continue in the coming weeks for finalizing the MOU and payment negotiations.
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