The Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission voted to recommend allowing teachers to carry guns on campus to stop future shootings.

Terry Spencer and Curt Anderson

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — The panel investigating the Florida high school massacre recommended Wednesday that teachers who volunteer and undergo extensive background checks and training be allowed to carry concealed guns on campus to stop future shootings.

The Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission voted 13-1 to recommend the Legislature allow the arming of teachers, saying it’s not enough to have one or two police officers or armed guards on campus. Florida law adopted after the Feb. 14 shooting that left 17 dead allows districts to arm non-teaching staff members such as principals, librarians and custodians — 13 of the 67 districts do, mostly in rural parts of the state.

Read the entire article:

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/florida-school-massacre-panel-recommends-arming-teachers_us_5c11a81ce4b0835fe3267586?section=politics&ncid=tweetlnkushpmg00000016

Wont hear that on eye witness news that's for sure.

Yep. Watched Eyemissedit News WFTV's report about the panels findings, no mention of the 13 to 1 in favor of arming teachers...….

Umm, the OP's article was in the Huff Post...that's more liberal than most news programs.  I'm personally shocked!

The recommendation to arm teachers is all over the media, but I used Huff Post as the example because I was surprised as hell that even they reported it.

http://www.google.com/search?q=parkland+school+commission+recomends+arming+teachers&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en&client=safari

It's been everywhere online, but im not sure aboard broadcast media reporting this particular detail of the commission's recommendation.

They may have but I don't really know.

Yeah, I'm not sure what the MSM is saying since I don't watch them.  I did hear this story on my local (Tampa) Fox News though.

Arming teachers in my opinion is gonna lead to more shootings. I've met many teachers that I would consider to be less stable than a nitroglycerin truck on a cobble stone street. I like how some Sheriffs are making a armed gaurd position at the schools.

COC
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You're a shining example of, "I believe in the Second Amendment, BUT...". Replace the word "teacher" with any other demographic of people you may not like, and see how it sounds.

And you base that on what? Because I rather a trained professional be armed then some 400lbs liberal English teacher that gets winded walking across the room? Stand by. A mod will be with you shortly.

You realize that the teachers that volunteer to carry end up with more firearm training than most police officers, right?  BTW, have you ever been to a gun show and looked at what many gun owners/buyers look like????  It's not like they're just going to hand out guns to every teacher and hope they can use it to protect the kids.  They go through background checks to carry and have to keep up with their training.  NRA even offers free programs for schools if they're interested (which many won't be because it's the scary NRA).

Aren't you precious. The report button doesn't change the fact that you're what's wrong with a good section of the gun community. And if you had bothered to do any actual research, you'd find that in order for a teacher to be armed in a FL school, they have to complete 132 hours of firearms training. As opposed to the FDLE Criminal Justice Standards & Training Commission 80 hours of required firearms training for police officers.

Keep huffin'.

And SB 7026 specifically forbids teachers to be armed. This committee is nothing but security theater.

Can't huff, its against department policy. But the fact that you seem unstable and incapable of articulating the argument you want to make without going right to childish attacks represents the type of behavior liberals point to when seeking to restrict gun rights.

Opinions are like assholes everyone has one. You have yours, I have mine. I'd rather real cops in the school. Regardless there is no guarantee a real cop or some wanna be teacher cop will step up when they are needed. In the case of parkland some putz past retirement figured a pension was worth more then kids lives. And when the first case of a armed teacher comes out running away from the threat let's remember this thread.

If I was a teacher, I'd be locked and loaded regardless of the law. Concealed means concealed.

Judge tosses Parkland shooting lawsuit. Cops and schools had no duty to protect students, she says.

South Florida Sun Sentinel

A federal judge says Broward schools and the Sheriff's Office had no legal duty to protect students during the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

U.S. District Judge Beth Bloom dismissed a suit filed by 15 students who claimed they were traumatized by the crisis in February. The suit named six defendants, including the Broward school district and the Broward Sheriff's Office, as well as school deputy Scot Peterson and campus monitor Andrew Medina.

Bloom ruled that the two agencies had no constitutional duty to protect students who were not in custody.

"The claim arises from the actions of [shooter Nikolas] Cruz, a third party, and not a state actor," she wrote in a ruling Dec. 12. "Thus, the critical question the Court analyzes is whether defendants had a constitutional duty to protect plaintiffs from the actions of Cruz.

"As previously stated, for such a duty to exist on the part of defendants, plaintiffs would have to be considered to be in custody"  for example, as prisoners or patients of a mental hospital, she wrote.

Peterson was the only armed person at the school when Cruz showed up with an assault rifle and murdered 17 people, in addition to wounding 17 more. Peterson has been widely vilified for taking refuge outside the school and not confronting Cruz.

"His arbitrary and conscience-shocking actions and inactions directly and predictably caused children to die, get injured, and get traumatized," the lawsuit claimed.

Medina knew Cruz and saw him arrive on campus, but did not confront him.

The lawsuit argued that the Sheriff's Office and School Board "either have a policy that allows killers to walk through a school killing people without being stopped. Alternatively, they have such inadequate training that the individuals tasked with carrying out the polices  lack the basic fundamental understandings of what those policies are such that they are incapable of carrying them out."

Kristoffer R. Budhram of Jacksonville, who represented the students, could not be reached by email or phone for comment.

Bloom's ruling contrasts with the action of a Broward County judge last week.

In that case, Peterson's lawyer sought to dismiss a lawsuit filed by the family of Meadow Pollack, one of 17 people killed in the shooting. Broward Circuit Judge Patti Englander Henning rejected his argument that Peterson had "no legal duty" to protect the students and faculty.

Englander Henning found that Peterson had a duty to the school community as someone whose job was security and who had an "obligation to act reasonably" under the circumstances of the shooting.

The judge also found Peterson was not protected from the lawsuit by "sovereign immunity," a legal doctrine that shields public employees from legal action based on their official conduct.

Joel Perwin, Pollack's attorney, said: "We don't think it's even debatable that Peterson had a duty to these students. Peterson's disclaimer of any legal responsibility is a mirror of his abdication of his responsibility for these kids," he said.

Peterson's lawyer, Michael Piper, said he would appeal the ruling.

You will never and I mean NEVER have "real" cops in schools.   Real cops are that way because they are go-getters who love the street and love getting into shit.

That doesn't happen at an elementary school which is 99.99999% boring ass work.   Neither myself or anyone on my unit would ever volunteer for SRO duty.   The overwhelming majority of cops in schools will always be people who aren't cut out for real police work or guys 5 days from retirement or guys being punished for something.  That is a fact.  If a teacher wants to be armed and shows proficiency in the training give them a fucking gun.

All day this.

So true.

Peterson was on the tit and probably there as a reward or favor for somebody.

Either way, he wasn't assigned to the school because he wanted to do real police work.

I was a SRO. Did it and very much enjoyed it since I gotto be a positive light for a lot of kids that had shitty lives. Miami Dade School Board even awarded me for my efforts. I sure as shit am proud of what I do and spent time on the road as a real cop.

Then you are the .0001%.  This doesn't have to be a point that needs to be proven.  Go to any agency, don't care where and check out the SRO ranks. Its exactly as I described and at both agencies I worked for it was well known to be a punishment/ retirement assignment.

The fact is that despite their play on the news school shootings are extremely rare and no command staff is going to dedicate their most dependable manpower to walking the halls of a middle school, and frankly they shouldn't.  Arming the teachers that train and WANT to be armed is the perfect solution.

In some agencies, SRO is a top spot to get because folks want the scheduling and hours. I agree on teachers being armed as a great defense. But not all agencies treat SRO positions as you speak of.

My MIL is a teacher (and a pHD), as well as a CWP holder. She is also one of the most irresponsible gun owners I know and one of the last people I would recommend be armed in class. She was approached by her elementary school principal (as one of, if not the only, CWP holders in the school) and asked if she would be interested in the training. She looked it over and declined because the pay-bump wasn’t enough to put her life on the line facing a shooter.

I told her she made the right decision, and changed the subject before things got nasty.

Just speaking from personal experience. I’m not against the option, but don’t like the idea of schools being forced to appoint someone who may not be in the right psycological frame of mind for the responsibility. I remember a few of my past teachers that would fit the bill perfectly for this role however, and would like to see the option available for the right people.

Not all places are like yours I suppose, we have had SWAT operators and even our one of our SWAT commanders was an SRO supervisor. Our entire SRO unit was rifle armed and trained years before our patrol division got rifles issued Division wide. We called it SSRT Super Secret Rifle Team we didn't want the school board to know we had them. Well before patrol rifles were En vogue. There are slugs everywhere but after years of rolling around in parking lots and ditches loosing blood sweat cartilage and bone and experiencing the frustration of the criminal justice system personally, going to work and having just about everybody glad to see you giving you smiles hugs and high fives is a neat almost unreal eye opening career changing  experience. It also provides you with the feeling that you would do absolutely anything to protect these people including risking your own life without hesitation. Plus you can attend every single one of your kids sporting events instead of completely missing half if them due to scheduling. Your Agency seems to have a complete failure of leadership if they do what you describe. Similar to leadership failures at Parkland. Our first line supervisors will order deputies to engage active shooters on the radio if they are not already doing so, instead of setting up perimeters and tending to wounded. It's a common thing to remind your people what to do if they aren't doing it. No one knew that down in Broward I suppose.

You guys are posting individual examples and applying it to the general that I was referring to.  "I was awarded for my work as an SRO" " this one SRO I know was a swat officer"  to say ALL SRO's are useless is of course false.  I fully acknowledge there are outstanding officers out there working in SRO.  But the same reasons that have been cited in this thread why SRO is a good job (hours,  schedule,  easy going) is the same reason it attracts the lazy, near retirement,  or those not cut out for something more dangerous  more often than not .

In the county I live in there are more than 200 schools,  the odds are astronomical that just one of those will suffer an active shooter.  Could it happen? Sure, but the stats say most likely not.  Do you as command staff prioritize your best people in schools where an incident may never happen,  of course you don't.  You put them where they're most needed and where their proactive nature will have the biggest impact,  investigations, special units,  street crimes,  patrol, etc..

If my original post implied that I'm bashing anyone who ever worked SRO, or that they're all useless,   that wasn't my intent.  A shorter version would have been,  "what happened at Parkland wasn't a surprise,  and I'll leave it at that"

My job now has me working with many other agencies, i see their structure and function.  The similarities are greater than the differences.  If I ask someone from there where their high speed people are,  they're not starting with, "oh they're in the SRO unit".  That's just been my experience.

That's true where I work.  Probably 1/3 to 1/2 of ours couldn't hack it in road patrol.