10 School Police Jobs to Be Cut

The Inglewood Board of Education has approved a plan to reduce costs by cutting eight of 13 school police officers as well as the department’s chief and lieutenant.

Parents and others criticized the plan during a special Inglewood Unified School District board meeting earlier this week, saying the cuts would jeopardize student and staff safety.

But Supt. Pamela Short-Powell said her plan to reorganize the district force would improve security by allowing for more “safety and security personnel” at the schools. She said that only two of the district’s police officers were regularly assigned to Inglewood and Morningside high schools, and that others often worked on traffic and parking enforcement near the campuses.

“I would prefer our school police officers and security be assigned directly to the campuses” and leave the outside patrolling to the Inglewood Police Department, she said.

Short-Powell said the money saved by hiring six so-called resource officers to replace the eight police officers, and by appointing a single manager in lieu of a chief and a lieutenant, would enable the district to install metal detectors and take other steps to improve campus safety.

But school police say the replacements will not be as qualified to deal with campus violence and drug problems.

The district’s budget for this school year is nearly $124 million. It expects to save about $1.2 million in 2005-06 by cutting the police jobs, switching some school calendars and cutting about 20 other non-teaching positions.