Lane Tech College Prep Local School Council Votes To Remove School Resource Officers
CHICAGO (CBS) -- The Local School Council at Lane Tech College Prep on Monday voted to remove school resource officers from its building.
Lane Tech LSC parent representative Benjamin Wong confirmed that the vote was 9-3 in favor of removing the officers.
The issue of school resource officers has been a matter of intense debate in Chicago amid calls for police reform and accountability.
In June, the Chicago School Board voted down a bid to remove police officers from Chicago Public Schools.
But a week later, aldermen picked up the debate and the chair of the City Council Public Safety Commmittee said he expects aldermen will get to vote on the hot-button issue.
Inspector General Joseph Ferguson told aldermen a 2018 report by his office concluded CPD recruitment, selection, placement, training, specification of roles, and evaluation of school resource officers were insufficient to ensure successful execution of SRO duties. He also said the report underscored a high probability students were unnecessarily being placed in the criminal justice system over problems at school.
Ferguson said his office in 2018 recommended a series of reforms to improve the SRO program, but lamented that CPS and CPD did not implement the changes right away, essentially letting an entire school year pass "without the protections and assurances of an appropriate school safety program."
However, Ferguson and CPS Chief Safety Officer Jadine Chou said many of those recommendations were later implemented for the 2019-20 school year.
