001now opening the someone need to mute their computer now opening the March 25th 20125 special meeting of the Santa Rosa City Schools Board of Education um please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance and then remain standing for our territorial land acknowledgement I I acknowledge that Santa Rosa city schools is on the traditional territory and homelands of the Pomo people traditional territory and homelands of the Coast Miwok people and honor with gratitude the land itself and the people who have Steed it throughout the generations this land acknowledgement calls us to commit to continuing to learn how to be better stewards of the land we inhabit by offering this land acknowledgement we affirm indigenous sovereignty and will work to hold Santa Rosa city schools more accountable to the needs of American Indian and Indigenous peoples all right
002thank you everyone for being here this evening this is a special board meeting we are here just to speak on one issue the um potential agreement between Santa Rosa city schools and Santa Rosa Police Department um so our public comment today is on that agenda item only um if you would like to speak on the item please make sure you filled out a blue card I'm going to allow three minutes each um so far I only have one student speaker so I'm going to start with our student and then go to the other blue cards so our first speaker speaker will be Axel O'Neal followed by Dirk shurmer followed by Melissa Stewart do I talk now hello trustees I'm a junior at l in high school and I felt it would be important to speak
003on the concerns with us adding Sr to our srcs campuses adding officers to campuses as replacement to many important staff we have had before such as our counselors and nurse and restorative Specialists who will not make the issue will sorry will not make the issue better it just removes ways students can cope after a situation that an SRO officer might be needed in would you really rather have someone with an armed we who may be corrupt rather than emotional support from a trained staff thank you our next speaker is Dirk shurmer followed by Melissa Stewart followed by Brent Stewart hi hi Dirk Shermer trauma anesthesiologist Sutter and Memorial Hospital I want should to keep one number in mind 1,772 that's the number of service calls to San Rosa city schools in 2024 there's one other
004number I think is even more significant but way smaller several dead children that's why I'm here police get called as a last resort after s situations have escalated they come in a panic unfamiliar with the people and say situations and Facilities they are arriving at often with lights and Sirens I want to remind some of you who are afraid of police that they are people too they're people we all went to high school with they have families they have children in these schools and when they arrive they don't often know what they are facing except that there's a weapon mentioned let's contrast this and this is a quote at the time it was the Nortenos and serenos I would have lunch with them their leaders would walk into my office and warn me of Brewing
005trouble this is a quote from my best man one of the last SRO at Montgomery High School in general the buzzword for those of you in education is called Community pleasing the campus administrators many who have been let go and some who can be rehired sro's teachers and staff and the kids themselves they know the 10 people on the campus that are traditionally the flash points these administrators and SRO often get to know them way before anything happens and before things escalate they are actually part of the community they're there at ceremonies graduations they are not called in as a last resort they are there in the proverbial Stitch and time saves nine to those of you who are opposed and I know I've spoken with several of you I want you to consider this
006do you want to teach the kids to fear the police leading to escalated deadly encounters or seek understanding of each other do you seek to provide confidence and safety to the junior high communities now joining men high school campuses or even just on a practical basis keeping the bathrooms open so kids don't leave school in the middle of the day to go home so they can go to the bathroom I would plead with you once again help us raise our children keep them safe provide them multiple opportunities to those of you who are interested in vocational programs I would ask you to embrace the police and even beyond that the fire department so that some of our students have an opportunity to see these as positive role models and might follow in their footsteps and
007add to Greater more sensitive policing in our community please don't seek to further divide our community create fear or alienate those Among Us who actually have children in the community as well that's it I have nothing else thank you next is Melissa Stewart followed by Brent Stewart followed by Kim stemac um good evening I'm Melissa Stewart um thank you all um that have collaborated on the you um it's much appreciated I know that was a lot of hard work um I will keep this brief and ask you to vote Yes on the program and set a start date this has been years Jaden's death has been years we have two schools that are transitioning to a 7 to 12 next year two campuses those families don't want to send their seventh and eighth graders to
008campuses that are not secure that do not have security measures in place families have left this District because of safety we know that we do not need more data and we do not need more polls for the last two years students and families have showed up begging for this program Montgomery students sat right down there and presented to you guys some in tears traumatized and they felt ignored and we felt pushed over for years please do the right thing this time don't ignore safety concern concerns they are not going away they're are mounting we're losing families to other schools that are either private or have SRO programs we need to attract families not scare them away that's all I have to say thank you thank you next is Brent Stewart followed by Kim stimac followed
009by Angel Ortega is Brent Stewart here all right then next is Kim stimac followed by Angel Ortega followed by Mel debret my name is Kim steac and thank you for listening to me I'm a an old an old mom as you can kind tell um strawberry Eagles Slater Montgomery and Sonoma State Seawolf and I've always kind of had faith in the boards the presidents the presidents of universities that kind of stuff our school board even our elementary one that they would do what's best and that has been shaken recently the last time I spoke here was that night when so many of us were here and it was when we lost a life at Montgomery and I couldn't understand at that time why we didn't want a safety res resource officer and I didn't I
010think because other things were going on I didn't realize that this is going on now and it's a likelihood because what we were left with last time is well we've got to talk to the police department and this and funding so I am anxious to hear what you all have planned with this I'm also coming to you as a couple weeks ago I was at the police department when they do they come to the town halls at the school about fentanyl I lost a son to fentanyl it's out there it's real I think if we have knowledgeable people that can be watching for things and helping with that I'm sorry in the schools that will be helpful my other question is the police um I think times have changed so maybe whatever predisposing people um
011feelings about them if we can look towards and get the right person in there in whatever capacity are whether they're with a social worker whether with but someone someone in in some kind of authority and the other thing I brought up a long time ago after 911 we got used to going through the process at the airport we got used to checking things I'd like to say there haven't been any other occurrences since we lost a life but there have and there have been many so I think anything we can do to protect it would be great and this is an old mom that still cares my oldest is 41 and I'll you know fight for them in whatever they're choosing to do and I thank you for listening to me and I I appreciate
012your time thank you next is Angel Ortega followed by Mel de Bret followed by alria De La Cruz hello my name is Angel Ortega and I am a concerned resident Alum and staff of LC Allen I'm here to voice my opposition against the presence of police at any public School according to the ACLU 14 million students go to school with an SRO but with no active nurses counselors therapists or social workers in other words those kids are closer to a pair of handcuffs than they are to a medical or mental health professional as we discuss returning an SRO program to our district in the same month that our intervention folk and certificated counselors are laid off it's evident and concerning that srcs is going to soon reflect that same statistic Sr are not a guarantee
013to make school safer during the school shootings and all day in Parkland and SRO was present at both schools and still dozens of students were killed in other words as I've mentioned in the previous board meeting as we continue to get rid of the people that make our schools safer and possibly reintroduce SRO onto our campuses the violence we are seeing is only going to continue and grow thank you thank you next is Mel de Brett followed by alria De La Cruz followed by Katherine Howell um good evening trustees my name is Mel de and I'm a special education teacher in the counseling and Rich program at LC Allen High School I know I've talked to you all at length about this program but our classes serve students with a diagnosis of emotional disability through
014individual and group therapy small class sizes and trauma-informed approaches the school to prison pipeline from SE special education to incarceration is resulting of inadequate Educational Services disproportionate discipline and referral to school resource officers in fact research shows that students with an ed label are more likely to experience exclusion through suspensions or expulsions isolation poor teacher and peer relationships and a punitive rather than nurturing classroom environment these students are also more likely than their peers with and without disabilities to be incarcerated as children and adults and are less likely than their peers to have stable jobs or pursu post-secondary education up until this year the diagnosis for students who experienced emotional behavioral barriers due to trauma were diagnosed as quote Disturbed legitimizing the dehumanization exclusion violence and mistreatment they experience in school this issue is an
015intersectional one as students with an ed label are disproportionately black and brown and disproportionately suspended expelled detained and arrested in school however research suggests that a positive sense of self- belonging and purpose are built through safe environments caring relationships with teachers and peers and authentic and relevant learning opportunities and are all protective against health and academic risk factors for students with an ed label this safety net is built through proactive approaches that involve the work of restorative Specialists family engagement Personnel nurses and school counselors research also suggests that SRO have the opposite effect on students with an emotional disability I urge you all to take a critical and holistic lens in your decision-making process that does not leave out the well-being and safety of students with disabilities particularly students with an emotional disability as these
016students are silenced erased and marginalized as it is I also urge you to do your research so as to prevent short-sighted superficial fixes that will ultimately cause harm to our most marginalized population of students thank you thank you next is alria De La Cruz followed by Katherine Howell followed by Deborah Tapia de Martin hello board superintendent members of this Beloved Community I am the proud mom of two beautiful chanitos um at Santa Rosa city schools who are loved who know their history and who are proud of who they are they know about the ways in which law enforcement has long been weaponized against their people against movements for justice against workers who are fighting for their rights and especially right now in this time in our history utilized to terrorize to criminalize to illegally Deport
017people to CH to challenge the rights of citizens and legal permanent residents to lift up their civil and their legal rights in this time where it's critical for us to stand up and say that this is not who we are I have four concerns with your entering into this mou tonight first safety it is proven that schools with a police presence increase their lack of safety the number of arrests the criminalization of teenage Behavior goes through the roof especially when we're talking about black children children with disabilities children who are immigrants are illegally pushed out of these systems and criminalized and their families suffer increased uh consequences as a result as being touched by the criminal justice system second cost please please please at this time do not spend our precious dollars on a service
018which we already pay for with our tax dollars I am happy to make sure that my tax dollars are going towards increasing safety in my community but I am not okay with paying taxes for police in our school systems this is a time when it's critical for you to be creating jobs for people who bring critical services like Mental Health Resources like like justice in our in our communities restorative restorative processes counselors people in our schools who are actually dedicated to the process of Education third the role of police officers in schools have absolutely nothing to do with education as evidenced by this City's past practices in integrating and disrespecting wellestablished curriculum like ethnic studies by creating programs called ethnic studies with a cop that did not actually teach the real history to students of
019color about the role of law enforcement in these movements of their histories but in fact just disrespected ethnic studies and read had had cops sitting with children who were black and brown reading books that just glossed over all of that history please don't do that don't bring law enforcement officers in to educate our children bring Ed Educators to educate our children fourth theou does not reflect an actual partnership how do you let the chief of police who is not a representative of our educational system make the final call about who is on our campuses these are our kids these are your responsibility these are our teachers and our how are you going to let that just be the decision that somebody else is making please do not do this now more than ever your time
020is up next is Catherine Howell followed by Deborah Tapia de Martin followed by Scott Kincade good evening Katherine how SRTA president um I don't have a lot of Statistics or impassioned please tonight um but I do want to say thank you for finally bringing this mou forward SRTA is still in support of this mou and still supports SRO on our school campuses um as the Educators in the room we feel that the SRO are not a sole solution to any of the schools problems but can be part of the solution and should be part of the team that includes the restorative Specialists the counselors and all of the other supports that our students definitely need and deserve on our campuses um getting to know the SRO as humans and not as scary police officers the
021the sro's are trained have chosen to work in our schools and will make a difference and I just wanted to reiterate once again the teachers of this District the teachers of Santa Rosa Teachers Association fully support this mou and hope that you vote for this mou to bring SRO back to our campus thank you thank you next is Deborah Tapia de Martin followed by Scott Kincade followed by Annabelle Nunes good evening um my name is deor Martin I have two kiddos in the district and I am interested in answers that I hope that you can um really explain when you are doing your explanation later on um I recently understand that there's a team such as the SSA the student safety advisor those are not resery trained what do they offer how do they get
022to the district what kind of support they have how many are we going to have in the schools and I just need to know how do we get to that um and also where the funding is coming from for this student safety advisers also I would like to know how many counselors restoratives nurses are going to be left in the campuses that you are putting together now what is the ratio are we going to have three restorators floating around for all the schools why are we getting rid of restores that I have seen in the school of my children do great work they know the community they are there every day they can establish long-term relationships and they have and now you have let go of almost all of them so for me if we're
023talking about safety it needs to be wholesome right I know that probably this mou is going to pass I mean the minority and I know that we are not counted because we're such a small amount I get that I personally do not support SRO in the schools because I don't think that they are going to bring safety in a social emotional way to kids that look like me so if at some point in your discussion you can be very transparent about all of the questions that I had before and it's also my understanding that the funding of the sros is going to come straightly from the Department of um from the police department is this true I know that there's a lot of things going on in the district a lot of scrambling the community
024is being Shackled in every way possible and there's a lack of transparency and we need to understand why you're getting rid of all of the restoratives but you're going to put a patch with sros and why is there funding for Sr and why is they're not funding for our started counselors all the that the teachers need thank you thank you next is Scott cancade followed by Annabelle Nunes followed by Tae schwager good evening board Scott Kincade parent in the district I just wanted to take a couple minutes to thank everyone as well uh that has been a part of the process and developing this mou all of the trustees that served on the 3X3 committee uh those that voiced their opinion uh to put together this pilot program those who voted on it back in
025December of 2024 um and those at the city city council has been steadfast uh by your side as has the chief krian um in developing theou it's been a real collaborative effort there's been other community uh engagement uh both from organizations that represent um all diverse backgrounds in creating the mou um it's been said by trustee deat to that the old SRO program is dead uh that we've got an opportunity to build this new SRO program from the ground up starting with this foundational mou and we can achieve greatness in our community as we've shown uh on plenty of other programs across our great County uh and in the city of Santa Rosa this is one of those programs I'm here to continue to support the development of this program along with funding outside of
026school dollars we all understand there are buckets of funding that can go to certain uh programs and I believe there are state and federal funds that can go to support this SRO program and we can minimize or eliminate any need for district funds because I do agree that this is one tool in the tool chest of safe campuses we have and should continue to have restorative Specialists we should continue to have student safety advisers we should continue to have community support from our parents on campus I've said it before this community in total as well as across the state of California has become numb to this violence that we see from Our Youth and we need to stand up and create accountability create restorative practices that um are healthy and work for our students find
027the student where they're at and get them the help they need but without a comprehensive safety program we're failing and it's been proven uh I just want to last leave you with when we start talking about accountability and and measurability of the success or failure of this three-year program uh take into account the last four years we have not had SRO uh I hope you have been keeping the data of everyone who's been in trouble working with restoratives that sort of thing and use that as an evaluation tool as well thank you for your time thank you next is Annabelle Nunes followed by ta schagger followed by Jason Farnham good evening my name is Annabel Nunes born and raised in Santa Rosa I'm a mother and a grandmother my children are no longer in um
028school but I represent and I'm here for every child of color um I attended the free the meeting that was at the Freedman center after the incident um when a child lost his life at Montgomery and um the children spoke and They too had asked for a wellness center versus having police on campus and for those that threatened to pull their children out of these schools as mentioned earlier by some individuals um remember you have over 4,000 indigenous students alone in your high schools without us you have no schools bringing police officers on campus um I have my own history and I've been here before and I've mentioned what I've been through when a police officer told me why my son was showing signs of being a gang member because he changed his shoes what
029are they going to use to identify our children and label them how are you going to protect our children from those police officers who have previously and still violate our children's civil rights and continue to question them without parental consent or legal representation it happens to this day someone mentioned about training um or educating people or having them trust the police well are you going to do the same with the police officers because they too deal with the unconscious bias and fear our children everybody talks about data Let's do let's let's look back at the previous years because I do have a PowerPoint from krian from 2017 to 2020 and how many arrests were made and how many of our children children were just handed over to police officers and incarcerated I want data of
030how many of our children if they come back to campus how many children were incarcerated how many of them are still in the system how many of those children were on an IEP plan and were handed over to a police officer when I was at the VPP conference I spoke to a lieutenant and when I asked him these questions you know what he said the schools started weaponizing the officer on campus thank you next is T schagger followed by Jason far Farnham followed by summer BR Rini hi my name is tajy schwager and I'm a current student at Santa High School this is my third year at sanah high my 10th in the district and I've seen the highs and lows in the evolution of safety here and I completely understand the desire for school
031resource officers at the same time I have grown up in Sonoma County and have seen this numerous specific issues with law enforcement here and I believe the call to reinstate SRO is a manifestation of desperation because other methods of addressing safety concerns in schools have never been given a fair chance I don't believe police officers should be students role models we are worried about violence violence occurs when emotionally immature people such as children and teenagers especially those who have already witnessed violence are faced with fear and anger violence is the same response we have seen from police time and time again in this community to those exact emotions police are objectively not equipped to address the root causes of school violence it is in fact unfortunate that the youth fear the police I don't contest
032that I ask you to really empathize with students who have that experience and understand it's not hysteria it's based in reality that police in this community tase people release dogs on people shoot people this is not something to experiment with even in the case of nonviolent confrontations entering a troubled student into the legal system is proven to result in further marginalization violence and reoffence to even suggest an SRO program that will cost hundreds of thousands of dollars if not more is to suggest it would be normal and okay to spend more on policing than education and Community you're not advocating for SRO as a part of a holistic approach because realistically all other parts of that approach are being gutted actively restorative Specialists people who take care of emotional well-being and safety which is a
033facet of safety are being removed from our school schools a guarded locked up property is not a sign of a safe healthy Community more people with guns on a school campus will not make it safer I ask you to remember why we removed sro's in the first place there have been on this board people who voted to remove SRO initially who later advocated for their them to be reinstated why is that are we really thinking through these decisions because they large impactful decisions have to really be well based in that think about the reasons we removed SRO initially students fear students experience with police and the Discrimination that is a large part of that the cultural factor I I ask you like seriously does that does that still matter I I hope it does and
034if it does prove it thank you next is Jason farham followed by Summer brini I have three kids in the Santa Rosa city school system um I just want to address this with these Sr these SRO the SRO we're talking about are not bullies ask Sergeant Crosby ask all the students at Monty if they thought officer Luigi was a bully they're positive role models they're biracial they're Latino they're female they get to know the students they get to know their family they want the best for the students they're not there to deport they're there to protect they're not there to intimidate they're there to deescalate this has to do with safety safety first our kids have the right to be safe at school this is a safety issue plain and simple unfortunately it's been pulled
035and tugged in every direction so that it's been made into a political issue but it's not so let's be clear it's about safety period not safety for One race or ethnicity safety for all the students who attend the schools so they can learn in a place without fear thank you thank you next is summer BR chelini is summer here hi I'm sorry I haven't planned anything in fact I wasn't even going to speak tonight can you hear me okay sorry like my heart's going to be out in my chest um I'm a mother of three boys two of which graduated already and the other will graduate next year um married to a police officer We Share three boys together and um it just it really saddens me how rejected my husband is as a community
036member as a father amongst all of you and when he's in uniform and he shows up at our school and he's rejected and eyes are averted when most of them are just such good people and I feel like our culture now is to just hate and not engage with them and not make anything better like is that are we in such a place that we can't foster a relationship with our police in this community that our fathers our mothers our aunts they have family in our school system they're your friends but we can't incorporate them back into school so that all of our children feel safe so that our parents feel safe sending their kids to school and I just ask you to see our officers in our community as who they are and and
037what they want to do for our community and not to bring your biases and your hate into every situation that just stems on for generations to generation so that's all and thank you for having us tonight thank you next is for n esposa ber Espinosa good afternoon my name is berosa and I am one of the individuals who was on the um recommendations for theou and I'm speaking from that perspective we gathered for months and months and the final does not not reflect our recommendations um at the time that we were making those recommendations it was prior to the significant financial cuts to the schools and the school closures and I do not think that it benefits our client our our community and our students to um pay for law enforcement when we are cutting
038their Mental Health Providers when we are cutting their teachers and when we are closing their schools um our youth have suffered enough they have suffered fires pandemics and violence and we need to get to the root of these um causes which is the trauma and mental health providers um counselors the teachers schools that are open and structure that's going to meet those needs not law enforcement that will criminalize Our Youth and um who are not trained to have the the ability to work with youth and our youth will have long-term consequences if they have criminal records in Immigration and in criminal law and so I ask that you please reconsider how we are showing what safety means safety means security and being able to know that you have someone you can go to you have
039teachers you have mental health workers you have people that listen to you and it also is a lack of um trust in the community when we have provided months and months of review about the impacts on um lgbtq dis disabled people non-english-speaking people immigrants and then they are not reflected in the final umou that's presented today thank you thank you everyone for sharing um I have no other blue cards so we are going to move on to our disc discussion SL action item um our speakers tonight are Dr Morales as well as the three trustees that served on the 3 by3 committee trusty delator trusty Jenkins and trusty Medina I'll just open this up um we created a timeline from June 2020 to the present in terms of when the board has made decisions um
040prior to my arrival so we share that with the community we share that with the trustees so everybody can see the history um I attended the last meeting with um with the the new 3x3 where um trusty Medina is the facilitator so I will turn it over to him and the rest of the 3X3 committee sure um I don't know I had the official title of facilitator but I'll go ahead and um speak um so we did meet this last time on March 13th um at that point um a document was presented to us that had been I guess reviewed by the SOS Police Officers Association which is srpd Union with a significant amount of changes um I I want to say that I was uh frustrated in part because we didn't get to go
041through a lot of changes um one of the thing that was that really stood out for me um was under Section 7 under the school resource officer training where they asked to have the part um that included harm reduction to lgbtqia plus um students removed from section d um as something that should be something that was required training um I think uh it was Dr Amy Carter who was there who did help to uh have that maybe added a little later in in section e as additional possible training but it removed that part as required training um one thing that I did try to address that I brought up the last time this was spoken up here at one of our regular meeting meetings was the issue of SRO training um the fact that SRO
042should have S training before being on our campus um I was outvoted so the language that you see here remains that um the training would be you know as soon as feasible but before they're on our campus it won't necessarily be included um I think some of the concerns that I have from the language here also the there was the section where um we had that the questioning the questioning of minors should be done in the presence of their parents and so this added language um that said only when required by state or federal law was added versus anytime students shouldn't be question without their parents present what to me is an issue of like parents' rights um stuff on the on the annual assessment there was uh in terms of the data recorded the
043the only data that um srpd kind of wants to report is on uh arrests and citations they didn't want to add other data on other interactions um so said it was too much work for them um I know that some concerns that have been brought up from our lawyers or some issues around insurance and um I'm wondering if superintendent Morales could add um some information on that and the one thing that we also need to address that's not included in here is what is the cost to the district because this timeline doesn't show when the presentation from the SRO committee that was composed of community members parents students staff um was presented but one of the significant things was what I think somebody mentioned earlier was that um I guess Sr were weaponized was the
044word that I heard um Sr were overused by um campus staff um which is something real and um it requires significant training from the district on our part to train our staff to to ensure that they know when the appropriate time to have an SRO be part of an interaction with a student um so I think that training still needs to be developed the cost of that to the district needs to be addressed that's not included in here um I think we've been very rushed that the with these changes and this hasn't been brought up especially in the context of of all the cuts that we're facing so um if I could defer to the superintendent and see if you could address the insurance and these costs real quick to so yes we had our
045the final Sr umou checked by our legal team and as as all legal teams will say they want to add more detail in the insurance they were okay as it was written but they wanted to see possibly more detail and more specific in terms of different types of coverage um so again we could theou could be passed and that could be added later in terms of the funding um we have always said that we don't have the funding in the district to cover this historically the SRO programs were covered by the city through a measure and the city is aware of that so we are not looking to have this funding come from the district um because we know we can't afford it um but in conversations with in the 3X3 and with the chief
046and srpd um they need a a anou that they can use to go out for Grants and find funding for it um and hence why we've been trying to expedite that process in order to be able to um leverage any funding that they might have access to and they need anou to actually be able to do that but it is very clear that the um funding would not be coming from the district I think a couple of the other concerns that arose to me in that last uh meeting that occurred was kind of a weakening of the language um that was presented by the the the union a lot of shs were changed to sh should which kind of decreased accountability in my view from that legal perspective um one other part that really stood
047out is the removing of the section of where sro's uh basically should not serve warrants during school time unless it's an emergency so that whole section was taken out um from the language proposed by the union let's see oh I'll let some of the other board members over there speak if you want to share something and I'll come back to me trator thank you trust Medina so just to be clear the lgbtqp plus A+ was not removed um specifically for removal the language was addressed because it's incumbent upon any SRO to um hold harmless for all students not just one set and if we were to name that set specifically we'd have to name all the sets specifically so that language was brought in further where it fit better within theou um just to clarify
048that this was not a lot of changes by the police officer Association it was clarifications um as we went through this mou for finalization this mou was written as stated tonight before by non-elected community members that would be implementing this work school sites srpd volunteer nonprofits throughout our County to provide supports to our children then daacp there are multiple facets to build this mou collectively to get it to where it's gotten unfortunately without an Sr program without an active Sr mou we have had officers on our campus for several instances with no active mou um guiding a relationship on how we expect them to show up and to present themselves with our students with our staff and on our campuses so if something happens we call 911 and they show up every srpd officer is
049trained to deescalate and work with children the SRO specific training that we have recognized as needing additional training is just that additional training and it's not that they would not step foot on Camp if they didn't have that training it's that that training is offered twice a year and we did not want to delay an SRO program if officers were not able to get to that training before school started or if promotions happened and different shifts happen within that SRO team if that officer appointed the SRO team who is vetted by site administrators community members the superintendent it is still the chief K's employee so yes he would get final say on who's placed on that team but that team member to be part of an srl program is vetted by the community and chosen
050specifically for those sites that fit into the culture and Community we are not asking to replace staff with sro's we're not taking funding away and releasing positions to use that funding to fund as an SRO program from the start when I've asked for an sorl program to be rebuilt and brought back to this campus I've never stated that this District should fund that previously it was funded by the city of Santa Rosa what I'm asking for is if we do not have this SRO mou approved then we do not have a tool and resource to research and obtain grants and funding for a program until you have a program you have nothing to ask funds for so once we hopefully get anou approved we then have an opportunity to have a tool to research and
051seek out that data when you had mentioned earlier about data not being collected that you felt was needed that was not the full conversation if there are citations and arrests demographics are recorded in that information if there are behavioral instances that sros are not needed School sites record that information so that those demographics are recorded with every interaction what was not going to be done by an SRO is every interaction with a student would they record demographics hey Billy how was the game last night hey Susie how was your performance that's an interaction and they were not going to record demographics that it's Community Building that is positive relationship building and they did not have the time and resources to record demographics for each and every interaction so that's what was taken out that's language
052um we want them to be a part of the collaborative team that works in unison to support and protect our students we do not want them to replace the holistic restorative mindset that this District intends to continue to work with and push forward we ask that they be a part of that team because officers are part of society and part of the team that we walk in through every day right now we have no active mou to help have an understanding of how again how we expect them to show up on our campuses with our students and with our staff and until we agree to this we won't have that so if something happens and unfortunately incidents have continued to happen with weapons with violent outbursts life-threatening situations there have been no SRO on campus
053to help deescalate and provide safety through those situations I just to follow up uh TR I I said nothing about demographics demographics is included I said interactions and I think the reason that's important is again because of the overuse of officers when when do they get called by teachers and stuff and they have an interaction that wasn't necessarily within the scope of the framework right so I think we need to have data for those purposes if we're just looking at citations an arrest it doesn't capture that so we're not able to see those interactions that may be occurring that are outside of the scope of theou that would help improve the program if that's the goal so I just wanted to clarify that um justy Jenkins did you want to on the clarification please uh
054since we're clarifying um when you stated that we removed the language that officers were not going to um interview students by law they are not allowed to interview a minor so that's why the language Incorporated only interviewing students and speaking with students within the means of the law by law police officers are not allowed to interview minors without an adult present the first thing they say is until your parent is here we you know do not say anything when they're interacting with a child in a situation so it's it's actually state law now that they're not allowed to interview a child without a parent present I have very little to add actually um I attended one whole meeting um however with the with all that's happening in our schools right now and has continued to
055happen over the last couple years I cannot say enough about the importance of getting a first responder on our campuses um to support our administrators to support our teachers and of course the students because we do talk a lot about trauma and we do not want to continue the trauma and I know that that has a lot of different meanings from a lot of different people but for me if kids are trying to get an education and they're witnessing someone bleeding out walking past them that is extremely traumatic if that's one of their friends and they saw that that's even more traumatic um and there's a lot of trauma stuff I do want to encourage literally everyone um whether you are for or against police in general and law enforcement the citizens police experience put
056on by srpd um is they're taking applications right now it's like I forget how many weeks it is like eight weeks or something but you really learn about law enforcement in our town I'm not talking about Petaluma or the sheriff's department or Chicago but our police depart department and it's it's interactive you get a better understanding of how our police our specific police department works they do talk a lot about sro's I'm not I was not a huge fan of the police department coming into all of this however with the leadership of our Santa Rosa Police Department it's a whole different ball game I remember at the after the Montgomery stabbing and just hearing Chief KGAN on the radio because I had no idea who he was um and really honing in on the mental
057health aspect of situations like this and the importance of that and that coming from the police chief I was a little bit astounded and being someone who works in mental health and as a systems person I really wanted to get to know the systems that were in play for our students therefore getting involved with ccat sart and mental health with kids in general and all of between those three systems at the time even for the last two years the police department is the one who the ones who are the Trailblazers here they're progress he Chief krian is extremely Progressive with how he builds Community um so I I just cannot I I just encourage anyone who has uh the words are not coming to me spring break is still in my brain but who has
058concerns about about sro's the police department in our town to please reach out and and look into the citizens police experience there's a student one over the summer that's a week long um just to get some additional information question your own biases see where they come from and and see if that's what's really happening or if it's if it's a historical thing that we need to still heal from because that happens all the time right like there's stuff that comes up all the time in our lives where we're like Oh shoot what on Earth is going on and sometimes it's something that's happened from your own childhood my own childhood included and we need to move past that so that we can show up better for our kids um so I I very much want
059to move on to a vote for this um and I do want to just touch based on the data point because from start we have requested that data not necessarily with the police stuff but um Gathering data at the school so that we have a better understanding of what is happening at the schools whether that be weapons suspensions what are kids getting suspensions for um expulsions and we weren't able to get that so I'm hoping that that that can be something going forward with s too I know there's like legal things around it um but because that came up in the 3 by3 meeting uh it made me think of conversations from s also I know which is starting up again soon so uh I appreciate the opportunity to be involved in the 3X3 for
060that one tiny meeting um but I do want to get to a vote too so following up on what you just said um I think one one important thing that was changed that I think really changed the big um critical component that was in this mou that came from the members of the community that help put this together was in the purpose and scope in the second paragraph um the part that was removed I read the whole line uh what's there now it's the the second line says the goal is to ensure a common understanding between the police department and School District regarding the respective roles and responsibilities in discipline and criminal consequences ensuring the partnership Fosters Equity maintains safe schools promotes a positive School climate and supports educational opportunities for all students the part
061that was removed at that last meeting was um so after respective roles and responsibilities this is a part that was removed in addressing and preventing racialized disproportionality so we're talking about these biases and these things that exist to show that they don't exist that was a key component of this and the union asked for that to be removed which again leads to distrust If part of this is creating trust in a program that works good why would we not hold this as something critical and important we're saying well at least from my perspective that racialized disproportionality exists why would we not hold that as something critical to look at and evaluate why not that that adds to that distrust and again changes the the whole purpose and scope a big key component of it and
062the word pilot was removed also in the whereases but I go back to the cost I know that the cost of the SRO is something that we're looking at getting um you know having a partnership to find grant funding for but my question is what is the cost to the district a key component is training of our staff are we going to get grant funding for that or is that going to come from from our own internal funding the creation and development of the dashboard the collection of that data um the complaint process and the monitoring of the complaints and the processing of the complaints that are included in this um all that I assume includes involves staff resources time money what is that cost who's going to pay for it I assume we are
063are we getting grant funding or not and that's the part that's missing that you know we we really need to address and and I think it's important to recognize some of the things that we've heard from the public you know what is if this is uh one of the tools in the tool chest as was mentioned um are we removing the other tools and then we're going to be limited on tools what's the whole big picture looking like but I think this cost thing in this mou needs to be addressed and we haven't as a district looked at all the different components on a on a smaller level to identify what that cost is can we actually afford it or do we have an effective plan is that still to come that's something that I
064think needs to address oh pause for now hasn't that been addressed though like we have to pass this before we can look at funding this part of theou includes a line that says that's waiting for that number right we have the the cost from the city it doesn't have our so it's just a little bracket there waiting so are we going to approve a pending number or that number does not have to be included for this mou to be approved that can be added prior to implementation once the district cabinet crunches numbers for us and gets us figured out so this mou can be approved as is for us to take the next step and research and acquire funding I think that would be responsible but that's my thoughts like to make sure we hear
065from every trustee before we take a vote uh student trustee student board me member Zuniga um so I I want to lift up um right now discussions that are happening with the youth around the district about this um this vote and this the re statement of this program um so on Thursday um Val which is an on the margins uh youth program is hosting an ad advocacy incubator event event on Thursday March 27th um it's open to the public um and the purpose is to come together to explore how we can better support the health and well-being of our students um it's hosted by our T action team which is our transitional age youth action team which is supported by the California Youth Empowerment Network Cayenne um and the commission for behavioral health behavioral health
066um with the highlight of our campaign kenot cops centering youth voices through storytelling art and dialogue and reimagining safety and advocating for mental health support in schools um a lot of us um have made uh art pieces um to symbolize uh our um experiences with with um these staff so there's dinner um the Sona filing meal is going to provide that food it's at the backdrop um 1455 Corporate Center Parkway from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. um the ne networking starts at 5:45 um and youth 14 to 24 who attend U the session will a will receive a $50 stien so it's a it's a paid training for all of the youth that um come so please um I invite all of the public to come to this because this is where the students are actually
067talking about the the program um and I urge you to listen because we're the ones that are going to be most impacted by this um the reinstatement of this program um and I feel like we aren't involved in the decision-making process as much as we should be um so this is where our voices are being displayed thank you trusty Casten just ask a clarifying question the committee six members I believe included Council woman Rogers uh McDonald and councilman oy what was the vote recommending this from the committee one okay um and if I'm reading the timeline right 15 months in process in the committee process to develop theou and the the the considerations that we're discussing tonight could have and probably should have been discussed during that 15mth process okay I'm just I want to
068be clear that there's nothing I'm just not seeing a rushed process I heard that word earlier and I'm I want to make sure we're grounded in the fact that we said that this was going to be a pilot program and we were going to do it 15 months ago and we're now at a place where we get to move to implementation so it we can't judge a pilot program we can't judge any program until it's operating until it's able to go out and be funded and not having an agreement with the city where we're able to go and address those things nothing within this prohibits us from coming back and developing more policy developing more protocols uh procedures training and actually to implement and flesh it out but we can only move to that place
069if we actually have an agreement and we're working in Partnership and we're able to actually move forward with the commitment with the city so for me this isn't a statement or a program that SRO Across the Nation what we want to bring here and Implement it's about having an SRO program that represents Santa Rosa and is a part of Santa Rosa's community and we're not a community that does policing the way that it's done throughout the country we're a community led by the city of Santa Rosa that has the violence prevention partnership that has the in response program that has the campus um Intervention Program that has the street Outreach and response team these these are all things that provide a scale of response a level of nuance to safety and uh violence response that
070is different than and in many ways hopefully leading the rest of the country and I view the SRO program is something that the city had done previously through funding that was approved by the voters um and is seeking to partner with us again to do again that continues that level of leadership and doing this type of work differently it's also that we've had four years now of trying to take on the responsibility of doing this as the school district in addition to our mandate to educate and enrich our students and we've tried to do so many things ourselves instead of working with the other government agencies out there that actually exist to do these things in the first place County Public Health the county the city all these different departments we need to work with
071them to enable them to provide their services because we're a part of this community and we don't have the money to replicate every single program that all these other government agencies do we've proven that at a time where we lost 2,000 students we added staff a time where we laid off teachers over the years where we reduced counselors or reduced coordinator positions we added staff because we tried to take the place of every single one of these other government entities that if we embrace them and work with them and partner with them and work on policies we can leverage their resources so we can focus our resources on educating and enriching our students and we have to do that every single metric shows us that we have to refocus where our resources are going and
072we can't continue to divert them to doing things that other agencies exist to do so I support moving this forward I do believe we need to you continue looking at the dashboard as we would for any program to make sure that we're continuously improving and building on it um and we need to listen to the city who is able to address violence in a way we can't violence isn't happening because people walk onto school campuses and decide they want to be violent on school campuses it's happening because of conditions throughout our community and the People Best equipped to deal with that are hous in the violence prevention partnership or hous in the um police Department they're housed in the city manager's office and quite honestly they're housed in the public health department and we need
073to enable them to use our campuses as a place where they can do early interventions and provide their services more effectively so that's where my I'm at for this trusty Kirby you have thoughts uh thank you um I just want to start off by reminding everyone that article one of the California Constitution states that all students and staff of primary elementary junior high and senior high schools have the inable right to attend campuses that are safe secure and peaceful it is our duty to ensure that this constitutional right that our students have this constitutional right it was mentioned earlier about the uh 7772 service calls uh to our campuses in 2024 there were actually 235 service calls in 23 over the last three years 5,796 events where our srpd was called to our campuses that's
074an insane number of events on our campuses I think it it probably relates in a way that perhaps what we're doing currently on our campuses isn't working completely and that we need another layer to help um prevent these events from even occurring as I as I mentioned earlier I was one of the uh members on the community ad hoc committee um when the previous board uh voted to not renew this mou um just a reminder that of the 30 people on the committee 27 voted to maintain the uh sro's on campus while updating theou the previous board the previous board excuse me the pre board uh elected to go against the recommendation of that committee um just a few things that were that came out just a reminder for from history that our SRO program
075began in 1997 the staff administrators and and previous board could not provide any instance where an SRO acted inappropriately during that time far as the I heard earlier someone mentioned uh mentioned the pipeline to prison just to be just to be clear ma'am could you please not interrupt public comment is over just to be clear um there is no evidence of a so-called pipeline to prison here in sowa County 95% of the cases are sent to Diversion where cases are resolved with communitybased programs typically in 2015 the California State Assembly passed a law ensuring that any juvenile who successfully completes probation a probation program has their record sealed that means deemed to not have occurred further at the age of 18 these youths can petition to have these records expunged I again just want to
076uh really thank uh this thanks the committee for bringing this mou forward and I look forward to it passing as a hopefully a first step in the right direction to get the sro's back on our campus when I voted to approve the exploration of a pilot program I did so against my personal beliefs because that was what the majority of our community were asking for but it has always been important to me that we ensure safeguards to protect the minority the marginalized students who might be impacted in a negative way I I still have concerns about this mou um I am not I'm not opposed to bringing the sro's back but I had hoped that we would have some more safeguards in here I do share a lot of um trusty Medina's concerns um it
077is concerning to me that theou can't name the racial disparity in policing um I would I want to work with our police department but I want them to be able to to name that to acknowledge that um and like like I brought up at our last discussion of this this I really would like to see more requirements around training um I hear I hear the constraints on that but I really I feel that trainings on how to work with our most marginalized students I feel that should be required um so I I still have concerns and if this passes tonight which I think it probably will um I just want us to make sure that we are still working on this as we go forward like trusty Caston said we can continue to work on
078policies we can continue to communicate and work with our Community Partners the police department yeah that's where I am trator thank you president Gali um with that being said and asking all trustees to comment on this um I do take the position to make a motion to approve this mou for the SRO program as being written um tonight I'll second uh further discussion trusty Medina sorry yeah um I did want to address a couple things that have been mentioned um first of all the the issue of a rush as I mentioned um rush in the context of only at our last meeting where we presented these changes from the srpa the the police officers Union um I didn't want this meeting to happen today I didn't think we needed to have a special meeting this
079fast one day back from spring break with this document only having been posted just last night for the community to review I mean students are talking about reviewing the document our community I don't think it's been what barely 24 hours since it's been made to the public for the very first time I think you know we we talk a lot about transparency and I think needing to hear from the public um more than just the the six people that were in that room I think we need more time to allow for that just a thought um truste Casten also mentioned that we can't do it all and I agree we can't do it all when this 3x3 first started when I and then mayor Rogers met the idea wasn't just to address Sr it was
080to address how the city and this District could work together to address a lot of the issues that our students are facing time and time again it just contined to focus towards the SRO mou I hope that we could continue to do more work on other issues but there is a lot of things that we need to address to get to the root of the problems SRO as I've said is just a Band-Aid to a much bigger problem that feeds into our schools from our community um I I have to um I want to say maybe provide a different perspective from trusty Kirby having you know he served on the committee and a lot of the members of the committee um did suggest to the board that the program come back with modifications And to
081clarify on December 14th of 2020 that's what the board did was send a letter to the city of Santa Rosa requesting to meet to address some of those concerns that was the intent of the board to address those concerns it never happened until after the March 1st 2023 incident so to say that the board wasn't bringing that back I just want to clarify that that is inaccurate um I think that it's really important to recognize that in these incidents and these relationships there's an imbalance of power and that's something that really needs to be taken into account [Music] um how some people View Law Enforcement is different and because of that imbalance of power I think aside from all the chaotic stuff that's happening in our country now a very local example that I think
082of is is Deputy ghous and Andy Lopez and him never having to face accountability for murdering one of our students um when we let go our admins for much tinier things there you murder a child and admin leaving back on the streets I mean very big imbalance of power and when I see majorly decreased accountability and just little tiny words in this document again it adds to that distrust I did want to read a little bit from the conclusion from the US Department of Justice's National Institute of Justice um report on school policing and just a couple lines from their conclusions they say despite the growth and popularity of school policing the research conducted to this point has not evidence positive results indeed some Research indicates the possible harmful effects especially for students belonging to
083racial and ethnic minorities they go on to say one conclusion offered by many of the research Community Based on the research today is that school policing is a failed intervention that schools and districts should not be using again the Department of Justice um I hear that maybe here in C Roosa things are different but the sentiment from a lot in the community based on the experience that we feel there is a very real um anxiety and Trauma that exists and I don't believe police belong in our schools on a regular basis I think it's important that we have a positive relation that we partner with them there's many things that we could do collectively and collaboratively but an SRO program is something that I continue to not agree with um I think this document is
084progress based on nothing that existed before um but I'm still completely opposed to having sros on our campuses thank you delator the language you referred to trusty Medina as being removed was not approved Language by the ad hoc it was suggestions made during the ad hoc committee um it was not language it was in there by the community prior to the ad hoc researching it I am completely understanding and sympathetic of the community's concern for police and the disproportionate abuse they have felt and that does need to be addressed and I do not feel that it's our current srpd officers led by Chief grian we cannot compare horrible actions by the sheriff's department that took a young man's life that I agree with you on and say that all officers are the same we simply
085cannot delay the opportunity to seek funding for this program any further we've kicked this can down the road long enough this school district has attempted to run sites without SRO for 5 years now and within that time frame we've had two students stabbed inside of their classrooms would that have happened with an SRO maybe but I know for a fact it did happen without them so I'd like to find other opportunities and continue to work on policies and work on wording and work on emphasizing building a program from the ground up that can be modeled throughout the country of how an Sr program is done through Right Way pushing for the social justice needs of our entire community and their respective would you agree that we need more we need to allow the public more
086time to actually review this document trusty Medina we gave the public 15 months they've never seen this document my motions out there has been seconded we'll vote on it tonight St cast um to quick comments hopefully and then just a request so I I think the other thing is that we need to recognize that the words that we say up here in the actions we take as a school board also build distrust in the parts of the community that feel like sro's are valuable and important the students who believe that they add safety and confidence to them being able to attend safe campuses and when we make false associations such as comparing or using an incident with the Sheriff's Department and trying to through Association say that that means that our Police Department is going
087to have the same problems I've said it before I wouldn't be up here approving this agreement with the sheriff's department it'd be a very different conversation we're talking about the Santa Rosa Police Department the folks who created the in Response Unit the police chief who served on the Nami board and understands mental health issues uh we're talking about officers who are out in our community doing things differently not always perfectly but they're learning and they've evolved over years thing the things that I saw 20 years ago that made me not trust police puts me in this position today having this conversation and being able to say the Santa Rosa Police Department has the ability to do this and continue evolving and continue to do it right because we've seen them evolve and do it right
088um and they're getting things right that people applaud in the community so I just want to be really cautious that we don't breed distrust by falsely associating this agreement this program this city with the actions of other entities um I all I've heard from council members and the city is that they want to work with us on more issues and talk with us they've they're requesting to do um joint meetings and things like that in order to get onto their issues so I don't think we have any lack of interest from the council because they hear the same things we do as elected officials which is that we need to do better for our youth and I think that is a unified sentiment so my and I hate to ask for a small thing but
089if we could just Empower a request to empower the superintendent to if the city's okay with it include the insurance language within this mou that is very standard language I'm across all uh contracts and if we just have a friendly amendment to say that we'd Empower her if the city agrees to include the insurance ins language um I can't imagine any entity not having $2 million in insurance coverage uh that would be able to provide certificates so that's my one minor request for those that made the motion student born member sorry I I just have to talk I think there's a fundamental misunderstanding of like what safety is um with this program and I think um safety has a a definition that applies to a many different people in many different ways um and then
090the the constitutional right that you talked about trusty Kirby that also applies to uh black and brown students applies to all students um and and what the data has told us historically um and actually Googling right now um trying to find uh what the National Institute of Justice um has said about the history of the SRO programs in California um I go on the homeland security Digital Library and I'm met with the content on this platform is is removed to align with the president's executive orders so I think it's it's actually crazy that the fact like that information and data and numbers are being taken off the internet regarding this um program and the history of this program uh because of our current Administration um and I think I don't know um yeah what I
091have to say thank you truste Medina thank you um first uh trustee student truste zun if you need a copy of the report I'd be happy to send you I downloaded it prior to it being removed um I think uh going back to uh trusty Casten the point that I was making was about power the imbalance of power um law enforcement is held to a different standard and and that was kind of the point regardless of the institution um it's a structural issue that exists uh that was the point um we still have not addressed the issue of cost that portion of the document I think that needs to be addressed and again um I think that we need to allow for more time for the public to review so I'd like to move to
092amend the motion to bring this back to a special meeting where we allow student input and Community input and staff input on this specific document so was a motion to amend if there's a second then we could go to that is there a second oh Amendment fails um I I want to address some of what trusty Casten and then trusty Medina said um you know when I said that I want our Police Department to be able to name to acknowledge racial disparity I I'm I'm not saying that about our Police Department I'm not saying that anyone in our Police Department specifically has done anything wrong it's it's what truste Medina said about power and structures all humans have racial bias we all do and it's important for all of us to acknowledge and work against
093that police officers have racial bias and power they have racial bias and a gun that makes it even more important to acknowledge that again I'm not trying to create distrust in our specific Police Department it's just something i' I'd like to be acknowledged um and to know that the police department and us that we are going to work on that that we're going to protect our students of color trusty Jenkins yeah just to kind of respond to that um because I've part of the citizens police experience and ccat as you can imagine I ask a lot of questions shocker but I I have brought that up and it it gets addressed um and so I would encourage you to reach out specifically to literally anybody in the police department to uh to follow up about
094that I know that like I'm not good at talking through like being the person that says all of the things because it gets jumbled um but I would encourage you to because I know that is a that's a huge focus of of how they train the um my words all the law enforcement team um but that is it's a huge component of it um so just so you're aware of that but I I would really encourage really anybody to reach out to to the police department to if you have questions they're very happy to answer them and to um to make those connections and solidify relationships within the community that is good to hear and I do hope as board president to meet with Chief krian soon truste Medina yeah I did actually want to
095comment on one more one more thing that was brought up and that was the issue of the school to prison Pipeline and a big component of the school to prison pipeline is disproportionality that's being removed from this document disproportionality is the major point of the scho prison pipeline um regardless of the numbers that's the key component that needs to be addressed and again in collecting the data and seeing the types of incidents it's about looking at how and assessing how does having a program like this on our campuses contribute to that disproportionality so I just wanted to reemphasize that and highlight part of the purpose of that because these are some of the real issues that those that stand on on my end of the issue opposed to police on campus and completely against the
096school to prison Pipeline and wanting to dismantle it or you that we need that data and and the recognition that it's an actual issue that it does exist disproportionality does exist and I think I also wanted to highlight some of those numbers that were thrown out there about incidents and arrests um I did see that report and um I did put out some questions back because some of the schools weren't necessarily Santa Rosa city schools our district uh there were schools from other districts so I I I would like to know the actual just for our district but the numbers are high but I don't know um it only goes back three years so we don't know what it was like before if there's been a huge in increase or if it's just been kind
097of consistent throughout um we have no none of that information of what it was like when there was sros on campus right so we don't know if it was the same back then or different um and again data wasn't collected so that's one of the components of this to collect data and be able to adequately assess and provide transparency to the public as to what's happening there any further discussion all right we have a motion by trusty delator seconded by trusty Jenkins roll call vote trusty de laori I trusty Jenkins I student board members Zinga no trusty Casten hi trusty Kirby hi trusty Medina no president MCN no motion passes all right thank you everyone for being here uh I look forward to working with the community and our partners meeting adjourned