5.30.18 – SIW –
DALLAS — Beefing up armed security, expanding the program allowing armed teachers and enhancing mental health services are among the options Gov. Greg Abbott offered to schools Wednesday in his effort to make Texas schools safer amid a rash of mass shootings.
Abbott’s plan also includes a gun lock giveaway, a social media strategy to encourage people to safeguard firearms, a new school safety app and an expanded program to help identify and remove dangerous students.
The ideas are part of 40-pages of recommendations for school districts and law enforcement agencies to implement, largely before students return for the next school year. The plan also includes legislative ideas for lawmakers to write into law next year.
The governor’s proposal includes $120 million in grant money to help schools implement many of the ideas and a matching grant program for more pricey programs.
The proposal includes items most frequently mentioned by law enforcement, students, mental health experts and others during three days of roundtable discussion last week in the wake of a shooting at Santa Fe High School that left 10 people dead and 13 injured.
The shooting came three months after a similar massacre at a high school in Parkland, Florida, that killed 17 students and staff, spurring national protests by students demanding better school safety and gun control.