TAMPA, Fla. – Hillsborough County school officials have decided to hold off on posting more security officers at campuses in the district.
Prompted by the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School mass shooting, the school board voted 4-3 in 2013 to spend more than $800,000 to hire 20 new mobile officers, reports the Tampa Tribune. The plan was that each officer would patrol a cluster of elementary schools until more could be hired. Two security specialists were also hired with those funds, and 10 more officers were hired under a federal grant.
The district had planned to spend $4.5 million over four years on security officers who would be posted at every public elementary school. The district’s new superintendent, Jeff Eakins, however, says the district won’t hire more officers for the upcoming year so that his staff can review how the officers that were hired spent their time last year.
The hiring of security officers was widely supported by school principals, but board members now want to review the program due to its cost.
