Parkland shuns arming its staff
THE FLORIDA school district that oversees the campus where 17 students and teachers were killed during a gun rampage in February will not arm its staff, officials said.
Despite new laws that would fund training and allow certain staffers to carry firearms, school board members unanimously voted against implementing the controversial idea.
“I have not met one teacher or one student who is in favor of arming teachers in Broward County,” Laurie Levison, a member of the Broward County school board, said at a Tuesday night meeting.
In the days after the Feb. 14 shooting at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Second Amendment advocates, including President Trump, pushed for measures allowing trained school staffers to carry firearms to help defend schools under attack.
Trump vowed on Twitter that “ATTACKS WOULD END” if “gun adept teachers with military or special experience” were armed.
The proposal has stood in stark contrast to local and national student-led efforts to push legislators to enact stricter gun control legislation.
Gunman Nikolas Cruz, 19, killed 17 people and injured more than a dozen more before he was arrested after sneaking out of the locked-down school.
Weeks later, Florida Gov. Rick Scott in March signed a $400 million safety package into law, which includes $67 million to train and arm school personnel willing to carry guns.
It also provided districts like Broward County the choice to opt out of the program.
The measure — the Coach Aaron Feis Guardian Program — was named for a school football coach who died shielding students during the rampage, according to CBS Miami.
School officials, instead, emphasized the importance of focusing on mental health issues and urged lawmakers to set aside funds for troubled teens.
“We should definitely launch a campaign to persuade the governor, for those districts who do not want to arm their employees, that they give us the money to keep kids safe,” said board member Robin Bartleman.
The law — which marked the first gun control measure passed in Florida in nearly two decades — raised the minimum age to buy a gun of any kind to 21, implements a three-day waiting period to purchase a firearm and bans bump stocks.