PRINCE WILLIAM COUNTY, Va. (WUSA) — Should retired police officers be hired as armed guards at schools? In Prince William County, school officials have plans to do that. It would make them first in the state.
In 2017, Virginia decided to allow schools to hire retired cops as school resource officers.
“We would be the first ones to try this using the retired law enforcement personnel, but I think others might pick up on the idea as well,” Phil Kavits from Prince William County Schools said.
Kavits said the district wanted to add more layers of school security from officers with experience.
“These are people who are trained already, they understand the needs they have the firearm safety training and all the protocols that go with that,” he explained.
How would this pilot program work?
Kavits said these retired officers would go to most security vulnerable places first: the elementary schools.
It would add five retired officers and one supervisor at the cost of roughly $500,000. This would be budgeted for next school year.
“If this is successful we would eventually move to a larger number of officers,” Kavits said.
Before this can become an official program it has to be voted into the budget this month.
