After Audit, Idaho School District Making Security Upgrades
The district is using a $74 million bond to complete the renovations and installations.
The Twin Falls School District has 14 school campuses.
A school district in Idaho is ramping up security following two unrelated incidents in school last year.
The Twin Falls School District will install new security cameras, card readers, door locks and make various renovations as part of a $74 million bond approved by voters in 2014, reports magicvalley.com.
All the district’s middle and high schools have completed the installation of high definition cameras, while new cameras will be installed in the elementary schools throughout this year. The new cameras replace an older system that captured grainy images, making it difficult to identify people in the footage. Each elementary school also only had six to eight cameras, meaning the full buildings were not under surveillance.
New electronic card reader systems will be installed after all the elementary school cameras are operational. The readers require some employees to use a card to gain access to the school and allow administrators to remotely lock doors in the event of a lockdown.
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Additionally, each set of classrooms has a door that can be locked and each school building has one main entry that forces visitors into a front office reception area, where secretaries with de-escalation and emergency management training are staffed.
“Obviously, one of our biggest concerns is access control to our schools,” Brady Dickinson, director of operations for the district, says.
Major renovations at Jerome High School will also replace the existing fire alarm system and move the gym, cafeteria and the administrative office to different locations.
The upgrades were partially motivated by the findings of a safety audit in 2014, which stressed the importance of safety improvements.
In May, a fatal drive by shooting near a high school and the discharge of a gun in a classroom, two unrelated incidents that occurred within 24 hours of each other, showed the need for tighter security measures.
Following those incidents the Twin Falls police department stationed officers at the two schools and students couldn’t bring backpacks to school. This year, students must leave their backpacks in their lockers.
The district will also station school resource officers at all district middle and high schools earlier in the day to monitor students arriving each morning.
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