This browser does not support the Video element.
Will school officers help, hurt safety efforts
A judge ordered MPS to have resource officers back in buildings by Feb. 17. FOX6 News spoke to parents and families about the debate.
MILWAUKEE - A judge ordered Milwaukee Public Schools to have resource officers back in buildings by Feb. 17. FOX6 News spoke to parents and families and, while everyone wants to keep kids safe, there's debate over whether officers would help or hurt that effort.
Should officers return to schools?
What they're saying:
Lawrence Wyatt has granddaughters who attend MPS schools. He believes school resource officers – or SROs – would bring much-needed security.
SIGN UP TODAY: Get daily headlines, breaking news emails from FOX6 News
"They do need the protection in them schools," he said. "It's just bad, so the protection with our police being there in the public schools – I'm for it. I'm for it 100%."
Patsy Howard, an MPS parent, said resource officers could be helpful if done correctly.
Milwaukee school resource officers debate; who's paying and how much?
There is a fight over which pot of your tax dollars pays for Milwaukee school resource officers. The public wants to know – and FOX6 News dug into public records.
"I'm kind of on both sides of this," she said. "I'm not totally against it, but there were some things I just think that it just needs to be thinking through."
Several other parents and taxpayers spoke to FOX6 News off camera on Friday. They were split on whether they were for or against resource officers in schools.
FREE DOWNLOAD: Get breaking news alerts in the FOX6 News app for iOS or Android.
The other side:
Milwaukee County Supervisor Juan Miguel Martinez sees things differently. He was in his first year at Milwaukee High School of the Arts when he said he encountered SROs in the years following the Columbine High School massacre.
"They had just installed metal detectors, and kids were being unfairly targeted because they were really trying to crack down on school shootings at the time," he said.
"I had a friend who came into school wearing a trench coat, not knowing that the perpetrators were calling themselves the ‘Trench Coat Mafia,’ and he got tackled by four SROs out of all of us, kneeled on his back and put him in cuffs. It was absolutely crazy."
Juan Miguel Martinez
Martinez said he was relieved when, in 2020, MPS ended its SRO contract with the Milwaukee Police Department.
"You treat kids as criminals, it will have an effect on their psyche," he said. "I'm very against having SROs in schools. I'm very adamantly against it."
What is Act 12?
The backstory:
MPS ended its contract with the Milwaukee Police Department for school resource officers in 2020. In June 2023, a bipartisan funding law – negotiated between the city of Milwaukee and Republicans in the Legislature – required the state's largest school district to bring them back.
The law, Act 12, gave MPS six months to bring 25 school resource officers back. The Jan. 1, 2024 deadline passed – as did the entire year. The judge's order on Thursday set a new deadline: Feb. 17.
The Source: Information in this report is from FOX6 News interviews and prior coverage.