When new Madison school board members take their seats on April 29, there may be a majority in favor of ending a contract with the city of Madison to place one police officer in each of the district’s four high schools.
Educational Resource Officers have been in Madison high schools since 1997 and there’s no reason to remove them now.
Because officers are embedded in their campus community they get to know students and staff. They often deescalate situations before they get out of hand. If the EROs come out of the schools there will still be incidents that require a police response. But now, the responding officers will be regular beat cops coming in cold. And because they may not know the students or staff involved, or even the layout of the building, chances for misunderstandings, even dangerous ones, become much greater.
Keeping the EROs in place is supported by the Madison Police as well as the teachers union. And just recently, school nurses from each high school and their supervisor sent a letter to district leaders urging them to keep cops in schools. “Both staff and students have great respect for our community officer,” wrote the nurses. “They talk with students, offer options and defuse situations that might otherwise result in arrest. They are honest and, therefore, trusted.”
And, in fact, the most recent report available from the school district shows significant reductions in citations and arrests by EROs.
So, why is this even an issue? Well, because a small group of vocal activists in an organization called Freedom Inc. have been disrupting school board meetings calling for an end to the contract. And new board members Ali Muldrow and Ananda Mirilli say they oppose the ERO contract while new member Cristiana Carusi says she supports phasing it out.
Board members Nicki Vander Meulen and Kate Toews voted against the contract when it came up in December. If they hold the line, and Muldrow and Mirilli vote no, that’s a majority of the seven-member board to end the contract.
In a recent post, Freedom Inc. gave this reason for demanding removal of the EROs: “In the wake of the recent police assault on five 11-year old black children at the Lakeview Public Library, we gathered to testify about the importance of divesting from the Madison Police Department. They have a long history of harming black people in Madison and should not be entrusted with the safety and well-being of black youth in schools.”
Those are strong words and so Freedom Inc. needs to be held accountable for them.
For one thing, the incident they refer to did not involve EROs at all. It took place at a library, not a school. But more to the point, the group has mischaracterized what happened as a “police assault.”
If anything, this was an assault on the cops, according to the police report. Officers responded to a call from a librarian on the evening of March 11. About 15 to 20 young people were causing a disturbance. When the police arrived the young people were belligerent and refused to leave. After about 10 minutes of trying to talk them out of the building, the officers started to physically remove them.
One officer was kicked in the groin, chairs and at least one bookshelf were knocked over by the kids and items were hurled across the room. Citations for disorderly conduct and resisting arrest were issued.
And, as for the charge that the Madison Police have “a long history of harming black people in Madison,” it’s true that virtually any police force in the country has had some history of racism in its past. But at least since the era of Chief David Couper in the 1970s, the MPD has worked hard to be among the most progressive departments anywhere. Freedom Inc.’s charge that children of color can’t be protected by the MPD just isn’t supported by the facts. A more accurate picture is provided by East High ERO Zuma Franco, who emigrated from Columbia as a child, became a teenage mother, and worked her way out of poverty to become a Madison cop. If anyone can be empathetic to high school kids in trouble, it’s someone like Franco.
There’s still some hope that reason will prevail. Vander Meulen had problems with a specific provision of the contract when she voted against it in December and Toews has said she has mixed feelings about the program. Board member Gloria Reyes had recused herself because she worked for Mayor Paul Soglin, but with Soglin now out of office she may vote. And longtime school board member Mary Burke says she continues to support the contract.
For the sake of everyone’s safety, let’s hope there are at least four votes to keep the cops.
Dave Cieslewicz is the former mayor of Madison. He blogs as Citizen Dave at isthmus.com.
