DENVER – Governor Ritter and two bipartisan legislative sponsors announced plans to create a Colorado School Safety Resource Center, which will assist schools in preventing, responding to and recovering from emergencies Jan. 28.

“Colorado is home to more than 1,600 public schools, plus dozens of colleges and universities,” Gov. Ritter said. “From kindergarten classrooms to college campuses, our students and teachers deserve safe, protected and healthy learning environments. By establishing this School Safety Resource Center, we can bring together experts from multiple disciplines and provide statewide expertise to help prevent school violence and better respond to emergencies of all kinds. We want Colorado to be a leader in preventing violence, not enduring it.”

Authorizing legislation will be sponsored by Sen. John Morse, D-Colorado Springs, and Rep. Amy Stephens, R-Monument. Colorado would join about 20 other states that have adopted some form of a statewide school safety center.

The Colorado School Safety Resource Center would operate within the Department of Public Safety with leadership and guidance from educators, law enforcement, mental health professionals and researchers. The center would serve as a statewide resource to help schools and communities blend and integrate expertise from education, law enforcement, mental health and social service professionals.

Initially, the School Safety Resource Center would identify several pilot sites to create and implement individually tailored prevention, response and recovery plans. Safety plans would include information-sharing and response agreements among local law-enforcement agencies, schools and social-service providers.

“Senate Bill 1 strives to ensure the safety of our schoolchildren by gathering real world solutions and best practices from safe schools around the country,” Sen. Morse said. “Our children are among our most precious resources; there can be no exception to their safety.”

“This is crucial for our children and their education,” Rep. Stephens said. “SB 1 is going to move us in the right direction and get us working together to ensure we are providing the best safety practices possible and addressing these issues in a comprehensive fashion.”

The School Safety Resource Center model was developed after a year of planning sponsored by the Colorado Trust. A day-long workshop sponsored by Gov. Ritter and attended by U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt following the Virginia Tech tragedy in April 2007 also provided valuable input into the School Safety Resource Center concept.

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Office of Gov. Bill Ritter, Jr. Jan. 28 press release

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