New Canaan Police Department checks on public schools doubled year-over-year in 2018 and will continue to increase, Chief Leon Krolikowski said Wednesday.
The rise in school checks—10, year-to-date, versus five at the same time last year—as well as in contacts with schools are “because [of] everything going on with our nation” and are designed to “make sure they are as safe as possible,” Krolikowski said during a regular meeting of the Police Commission, held at NCPD headquarters.
Asked about the initiative before the commission went into executive session, the chief said the attention on schools is “more intensive.”
“I don’t want to go into specifics, but we are paying more attention and trying to be more diligent in our checks and make people feel safer,” he said.
Asked whether the intensified effort follows directly from the school shooting deaths last week of 17 people in Parkland, Fla., Krolikowski said, “A little bit.”
“We have our SROs at the high school and junior high school. We also have our liaison officers that are assigned to all the other schools that are temporary part-time kind of thing, as a connection. But as part of their normal patrols, officers check the schools and drive through the lots and sit in the school for a while when they can and that’s kind of the concept.”
The chief’s report follows a massacre in Florida that’s reignited passionate discussion about how that state, and the nation, can curb shooting deaths. Connecticut, which passed somewhat stricter gun laws in the wake of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, saw a sharp reduction in deaths resulting from firearms between 2012 and 2016, officials say.
In addition to funding for NCPD’s complement of officers which includes SROs at NCHS and Saxe, the department’s budget request for next fiscal year includes $24,000 for school guards.
The school resource officers both NCHS and Saxe not only bolster safety—and have handled some unusual situations—but also cultivate trusting relationships with students.
At the high school last year, the SRO spotted a 22-year-old man—later identified as a former student—who tried to enter the cafeteria from an exterior door. The man provided false information to police when confronted, and was arrested. The middle school SRO in the fall voiced concerns to district officials about the prevalence of “vaping” among students as well as out-of-control social media use.