Report: Comply with safety laws now

Dangers to schools are imminent and urgent and the state Legislature needs to act, grand jury says

Broward County stars as the poster child for flawed emergency communications, under-reported student issues and last-second scrambles to comply with statewide school-safety laws, according to a statewide grand jury report released late Wednesday.

The 18-page report zeroes in on Broward County while suggesting recommendations for districts statewide. It strikes an incredulous tone in its blast of of slow-to-comply school districts.

“There is no conceivable set of circumstances,” the report said, “that any Florida school, charter or not, should be unprepared to comply.”

It is the second report put out by this grand jury since Gov. Ron DeSantis impaneled it to ensure school districts are meeting safety requirements passed by the Legislature after the Feb. 14, 2018 massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

It has been meeting in secret in Broward County since June.

The report says it was issued now because the dangers are imminent and urgent and the state Legislature needs to act when it next goes into session in January.

“As Attorney General and as a mother, the safety of our children is of paramount importance to me and this latest Grand Jury report confirms what many of us have feared—that our schools are still not as safe as they could be,” Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody said in an emailed statement.

“I urge all elected officials in school districts across the state to ensure

compliance with the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Safety Act, and I want to thank the Grand Jury for their deliberate and detailed work.”

A state agency should be assigned to oversee and manage local compliance, the report said. It suggests the duty go to the Florida Department of Education.

“Compliance will never be satisfactory if the Legislature does not take steps to designate an agency to monitor and supervise compliance,” the report said.

School districts cannot be counted on to report their own failures, noncompliance and deficiencies, the report said, so it “would be taxpayer money well spent.”

Broward County needs to settle its turf wars between the county, the sheriff ’s office and local authorities over who is going to control emergency communications.

“Evidence has shown,” the report said. “That localization of communications is inefficient, and we believe the regional model is superior in terms of overall communications benefits.”

The report also said enough with separating charter schools from the rest.

“We want to make clear, charter schools are public schools funded with taxpayer money,” the report said.

Oversight is the responsibility of local school districts and each one should ensure that their charter schools are sufficiently staffed with at least one school security officer during school hours, the report said.