Earlier this week, the Alexandria City Council overrode the objections of the School Board and voted to reallocate funding away from the school resource officer (SRO) program — eliminating the program.
SROs are police officers stationed inside T.C. Williams High School, Francis Hammond Middle School and George Washington Middle School and specialize in handling kids with emotional and education issues, search and seizure on school grounds, and school shooting situations. The program started in 1997.
The School Board voted last year to keep the SRO program, but the City’s defunding vote throws the School Board’s memorandum out the window.
Instead, the $800,000 in funding that had gone to SROs will go toward mental health resources for school aged children and Alexandria Police Department officers who had functioned as SROs will be reassigned. The city still, as City Council member Canek Aguirre noted, spends around $1 million annually on private security for the schools.
Recent Stories
Nearly a fortnight after a snowstorm shut down Alexandria, the city’s emergency services finished pretreating local roads just before the snow started to fall. “In advance of the storm, T&ES…
In a release to parents and staff put out today (Sunday), Alexandria City Public Schools (ACPS) said everyone in Alexandria schools will still be required to wear a mask despite…
It’s been a busy week in Alexandria with City Council coming back into session for the first time in 2022. With a majority of the Council being new, there are…
On New Year’s morning, Luke Shlagel of Shlagel Farms was among a handful of vendors at the weekly Del Ray Farmer’s Market. Some customers asked why he wasn’t hanging out…
