DELAND, Fla. – Volusia County school leaders are disappointed, they said, that they were denied extra deputies to fill school resource roles.
The decision came on Tuesday with a unanimous vote by the county’s council. On Wednesday, district leaders spoke with News 6 about their plans moving forward and why they could have been denied.
Patty Corr, the district’s interim chief operations officer, said they are determined to get law enforcement in the middle schools that only have school guardians. She said now that the county has denied providing more deputies, they’re going back to the drawing board.
“Having a law enforcement officer on the campus is a deterrent. We have the statistics to show it helps and it’s beneficial. They get engrained in the school community,” she said.
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Corr said the district’s current agreement with the Volusia Sheriff’s Office for this school year states that the county provides seven school resource deputies with 55% of the cost paid by the schools and 45% paid by the county.
Corr went to the county council Tuesday to ask for the approval of seven more deputies.
“Historically we have had school resource deputies in these middle schools and they have been taken away due to staffing over the years,” said the district’s spokesperson Danielle Johnson.
The district said the seven middle schools had to call for law enforcement a combined 257 times in the first month and a half of this school year.
Both the district and Sheriff Mike Chitwood told News 6 they had discussed the amendment to the current agreement before Tuesday’s meeting, and Chitwood said he was ready to hire the staff but just needed the council to approve the budget.
“We had secured our 55%; we are tapping into our budget for that and we just wanted a continuation of the sheriff’s agreement we already have,” said Johnson.
The council members argued over the district’s budget and reserves and how this request came after the county’s budget was set.
Volusia County Council Chair Jeff Brower released a statement on Wednesday that reads:
“Volusia County’s commitment to the safety of our children is resolute and unwavering. It is disappointing and disturbing to know that the school district failed to adequately fund school security. The school district sought to expand their program and asked the Volusia County Council to pay for it at a cost of an additional $342,905 despite their obligation to plan and fund the program and not seek a bail out from the County. They are harboring substantial reserves that could easily cover the costs of this vital service and attempting to divert financial their responsibility to another agency is irresponsible and unacceptable.”
Jeff Brower, Volusia County Council Chair
The district said it was all irrelevant to the request due to the layout of the agreement but the council unanimously denied them.
“We will continue to work on this because we believe in having law enforcement on all of our middle and high school campuses,” said Corr.
The district said it will now go to the police departments that currently don’t provide school resource officers in hopes of filling the gaps.
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