Shooting sparks security review

COLEBROOKDALE » In the wake of the Feb. 14 school shooting in Parkland, Fla., the Boyertown Area School Board followed the line of thinking expressed in so many places since that day — can it happen here.

“To be honest, that’s the one thing that keeps me up at night, that something like this would happen in Boyertown,” said board Vice President Steve Elsier.

But while many share the sentiment, solutions may not come any more easily than they have in the rest of the country.

Elsier said he would like the administration to provide an update and consider possible additional measures to improve school defenses against a shooter.

“Obviously, this may entail

some capital expenses. Obviously, this may entail some personnel,” he said. “We can’t control the Second Amendment, but can control what do to keep children safe.”

“There is no amount of money you can put against a life,” said board member Ruth Dierolf.

“This is a secure buildings issue, not a guns issue,” said board member Clay Breece.

“We asked for gun-free zones and that’s what we got. Anyone with a gun knows where gun-free zones are,” he said, adding “we need to do something and stop talking in political circles. We can solve this as a nation.”

But David Krem, the district’s interim superintendent, warned that solutions can be elusive.

Krem said he has twice dealt with “active shooter” issues in his career and disagrees with President Trump that arming welltrained teachers is the right answer.

“What parent wants to raise their hand and say they’re OK with their kid watching their teacher kill someone?” he asked.

“The number one key element in school safety, is the parents,” said Krem. “But we have to tighten up our program. Every school district does because every school district whose members walk around and think ‘it can’t happen here,’ is as wrong as wrong can be.”

“It can happen anywhere, at any time and the numbers prove it. We’ve had 137 school shootings since 1980 and 297 students have been killed,” said Krem.

“One thing I’ve learned for sure; if you have a shooter who wants to get into your building, they’re going to get into your building. It doesn’t matter how many armed guards you have or how many metal detectors you have.”

“Part of the preparedness is young children. You have to make sure those children don’t panic and that comes with practice. Just like with a fire drill, we practice active shooter drills, stranger in the building drills, lockdown drills so the children know to stay calm, keep their mouth shut, listen to their teacher for direction,” Krem said.

“For a kindergartner, it scares the heck out of them, when these things happen, but if the parents are involved and reassure the child about what’s going on, then it takes that fear away and if you practice it monthin and month-out, then it’s just another drill,” he said.

Some parents have suggested armed guards at the schools and Krem said “I crunched the numbers. It costs $1 million for one armed guard at the front door of every school. It’s a million dollars a year and it only goes up.”

After the meeting, he explained that he “used what we generally pay for a police officer for three hours at our board meetings. The parent wanted armed police officers at every school, so I broke down the average bill to a one-hour rate, multiplied that by eight hours per day, by 190 school days; by ten buildings. It comes out to about $990,000.00.”

Board member Brendon Foose said he was at Boyertown High when the Columbine shootings shocked the nation, and it’s only gotten worse since then.

Instead of asking for a security update once, he suggested the board commit to doing an annual review of security measures.

Board member Jill Dennin said that whatever measures are finally put in place, it will be key to communicate that information to parents and the community so they can be informed about the district’s efforts.