Not if, but when: Parents of slain Parkland students urge Utah lawmakers to pass school safety bill

The parents of children killed in the 2018 Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting have a stark warning for Utah lawmakers: “It’s not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when and where the next school shooting will happen.” 

That was the message from Max Schachter, the father of Alex Schachter who was one of the 17 victims murdered in Parkland, Florida in 2018. On Tuesday, he stood alongside Utah lawmakers, law enforcement and education officials urging the passage of a sweeping school safety bill that would mandate threat reporting, require classrooms to have panic alert devices and secure entrances, and create a guardian program to arm and train some school employees. 

“We were complacent in our state. We never thought it would happen in our community. But it can and it does,” said Schachter. 

At over 2,000 lines long and sponsored by Rep. Ryan Wilcox, R-Ogden, HB84 would create a set of uniform, minimum standards for all Utah schools to adhere to. Among the bill’s provisions are: 

• Emergency communication systems in schools, including panic buttons and video camera access. 
• A new set of training standards for school resource officers.
• A school guardian program, where school employees are trained to carry a firearm and respond to an active shooting. 
• Mandatory threat reporting for school employees. 

The bill is a culmination of months of work from Utah’s School Security Task Force, which includes lawmakers, law enforcement officials and educators. Wilcox even toured Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School which he said “sits like a time capsule.” 

Wilcox’s bill includes “Alyssa’s Law,” legislation now passed in a number of states mandating silent panic alarms in classrooms that are directly linked to law enforcement. The bill’s name comes from Alyssa Alhadeff, a student at Marjory Stoneman killed in her English class. 

Her mother, Lori Alhadeff, spoke Tuesday during the news conference, where she referred to her daughter as “the heartbeat of our family.”  

“We want to see Alyssa’s Law passed here in Utah as a standard level of safety protection in every school, so that when there’s a medical emergency or active shooter situation, a teacher can push a button and it’s directly linked to law enforcement,” Alhadeff said. 

One of the more controversial parts of the bill is the armed guardian program. Modeled after initiatives in Texas and Florida, guardians would be armed school employees who are trained by law enforcement and activated in an emergency. “Otherwise, nobody knows they are there,” Wilcox said on the House floor last week. 

“It’s about the gap time,” Wilcox said. “Even in a best-case scenario, you’re talking 15 minutes” for a police response. 

The bill will require approval from a Senate committee before being considered by the entire Senate. It passed the House after a 50-16 vote, with funding proving to be a sticking point for some lawmakers. 

HB84 could cost Local Education Agencies almost $20 million each year, according to the bill’s fiscal note — implementing the early warning software alone could cost the State Board of Education over $2 million annually. 

“My concern is not that we need to provide a safe environment. We do. My concern is we can only do that as fast as we have funds,” said Rep. Susan Pulsipher, R-South Jordan. 

Pulsipher was one of the “no” votes, telling the House the bill will burden the weighted pupil unit, or WPU, the per-pupil rate used to calculate how much money each school should receive. 

After the news conference on Tuesday, Sen. Don Ipsom, R-St. George, said the Senate is going to work to fund the various programs the bill will enact. But where that money will come from is still “in flux,” he said. 

“We can’t send it out to small districts without some help, so we’re trying to figure that out,” he said. 

The ‘fire marshal’ of school safety 

Assuming the bill passes, Matt Pennington, Utah’s new state security chief under the Department of Public Safety, will be tasked with its rollout. About a month into the job, Pennington on Tuesday said getting law enforcement, teachers, administrators and parents on the same page is proving to be a big lift. 

“You have 41 school districts, you have 1,300 physical locations and everybody is doing what they think is best. And not to say what they’re doing is wrong, it’s just not standardized,” Pennington said.

Comparing the position to the state fire marshal, Pennington will be working on site and building safety assessments, model policies, emergency operation plans, training and drills. The hope is to create a uniform set of policies across the state.   

“It doesn’t matter if they move from Logan to St. George, it’s going to be a familiar concept, familiar terminology. The drills are going to be the same. That’s the hope,” Pennington said. 

The department will also oversee the training curriculum for school guardians, while compiling a database to track who enrolls in the program. 

This story was originally published in the Utah News Dispatch