With students returning to campuses countywide this week, Brevard County School Board is speeding up security projects to install $8.2 million worth of fencing, security cameras and remote-controlled locks at every school in the district using the money voters approved in 2014 from the half-cent sales tax.
Head custodian Eddie Bickhardt inspects a new security door frame in the front office at Ocean Breeze Elementary
On June 13, the school board voted 4-1 to expedite the upgrades, which upped the total cost of the project nearly 44 percent, or $2.5 million from the initial bids of $5.7 million to the current estimate of $8.2 million.
Matt Reed, Brevard Public Schools spokesman, explained the urgency. “If you talked to parents, teachers and school leaders, the number one priority is the safety and security of the kids.”
But hardening school facilities with these beefed-up security measures will mean a huge cultural and community change – the end of an era – for beachside schools, and for families.
School Board member and Indialantic resident Tina Descovich, who represents the South Barrier Island, voted against the accelerated schedule and added cost, despite school security being a top priority for her. She expressed skepticism that this expensive rush job is the most effective way to meet the unique security needs of individual schools.
“Each school has different needs. Maybe that means one school gets something different because their school needs are different,” she said. “Gemini is a closed-in school and isn’t in need of a perimeter fence as much as some of our open schools like Ocean Breeze and Indialantic.”
The Melbourne Beachsider went to Ocean Breeze Elementary in Indian Harbour Beach to see what changes have occurred there. The lobby counter area has been reconfigured, and Principal Laurie Hering showed us the new locking door system that was still under construction. “The construction will continue throughout the school year, but only after school hours,” she said.
That door will only protect administrative and clerical staff who work behind it, not students, but eventually, Hering said, the school will be completely fenced in. Plans are to have perimeter fencing completed by the spring of 2018.
The main office will be the only way to gain entrance into the school during school hours. Parents and visitors will have to check in as usual at the front desk. From there they would gain access to other entry ways via existing doors and new fencing, but all of those will locked. Video cameras and monitors will be installed and all visitors will have to be buzzed in – but only after they have checked in. Mrs. Hering also assured us that crash bars will be on the inside of all doors so anyone can get out during an emergency.
Beachside schools like Ocean Breeze have parent volunteers and visitors on campus all day long. Whether they are dropping their kids off at their classrooms, talking to teachers, working on a fundraiser, reading to students, having lunch with their kids or picking them up at dismissal, parents and even grandparents are a constant presence. The hallways are always buzzing with traffic. Hering said hopes the security upgrades won’t change that too much. “All doors and fences would lock at 8 a.m. when class begins and some will unlock around 2:20-2:25 just before dismissal” she said. “This would allow parents to continue to walk with their children to and from class.”
Twenty-one Brevard public schools will have a single point of entry where a security camera will be installed. The front office of the school and district security can view the feed. The Brevard County Sheriff’s Office also recommended that each school front office should have the ability to automatically lock and unlock the gates by pressing a button.
Brevard Public Schools has teamed up with the Sheriff Wayne Ivey’s agency to implement additional safety measures. These include: improved badging system for employee and visitor access to buildings,;school and district staff briefings on common threats and precautions such as locking classroom doors; and intensified investigations by district security.
Overall spending on security is expected to remain at about 3 percent of the total surtax spending over the eight years of the tax, according to officials. “We think it’s a big step toward keeping kids safe,” said Reed.
