Tim Helder, the level-headed sheriff of Washington County, earns our nomination for model Arkansas sheriff.
He's serious about the job. He's professional. He's adept at keeping the drama in a policing agency to a minimum, a sometimes Herculean task. And, while he recognizes the role emotions play in law enforcement and criminal justice, his demeanor helps steer discussions always back to "just the facts."
What’s the point?
Armed school employees? Washington County Sheriff Tim Helder says the idea can make sense and he makes a interesting argument.
Those qualities may be a reason Republican Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson nonetheless picked Helder, a longtime Democrat, to serve on his 18-member Arkansas School Safety Commission.
"School safety," in another time, might have described a commission is looking into playground equipment or big, yellow school buses, but we all know what it means today. In 2018 America, school safety is the NRA-safe terminology one uses to discuss the attacks in our nation's schools without labeling them as a gun problem. Without a doubt, the tragedies this panel is trying to address are gun-related, but myopically focusing on the tool of choice for armed intruders is to invite plenty of emotion and little progress.
The discussion has to be broader and, yes, at least aware of the realities. We're in Arkansas. Some sort of wholesale shift in attitudes about the "right to keep and bear arms" isn't likely, given who the people of Arkansas have elected to put in charge of our great state. There is little reason to believe the state's Legislature is going to suddenly become interested in restrictive gun laws, on the assumption those would solve the matter of school violence. The commission's task is to figure out not just what should be done, but also what can be accomplished.
Put 18 people in a room and it's hard to find common ground on such a volatile subject, but that's what the commission has been asked to do. We wish them well, because what everyone -- left, right, red, blue, liberal, conservative and everything in between -- agrees on is the need to protect children as they attend our public schools.
Last week, Helder presented the recommendations of the commission's law enforcement subcommittee. Our inclination is toward policies that improve school safety without adding more guns to the equation. But, to our surprise, we found the good sheriff and his subcommittee making an effective argument that a one-size-fits-all approach simply isn't reasonable because our state's 238 school districts have distinctly different needs, resources and philosophies.
Ensuring school districts have the option to arm some teachers or staff, Helder said, is a protective move that "can be immediately implemented and will effectively improve safety."
"Understanding that there is a difference between feeling safe and being safe, we believe true safety can only be accomplished with a paradigm shift, where we recognize and acknowledge the vulnerability of schools in today's society," Helder said as he introduced proposals to the full commission.
"It has become apparent that a rapid armed response, from within the school building, saves lives," he said. "The faster a school shooter is engaged by armed responders, the sooner the situation is halted. This directly translates to lives saved."
In Clarksville's schools, which have taken the lead on developing a program of armed employees, those authorized can bring their holstered arms on campus but must lock them away in gun safes for the day. They're close enough to be accessible in a crisis, but routinely stay in the locked safe.
Undoubtedly, those who believe guns are THE problem were falling out of their seats. Perhaps mindful of their concerns, commission Chairman Cheryl May rightly pointed out most school administrators, teachers and parents support expanded use of school resource officers, which are local law enforcement officers specifically trained and assigned to school buildings. They're less enthusiastic about so-called "commissioned school security officers," who are select, volunteer school employees who go through at least 60 hours of initial security training before being authorized to have a guns on campus for defensive purposes.
Helder acknowledged the facts. "If money were no object and all schools and law enforcement agencies played well together, we would love to have [a school resource officer] on every campus," Helder said.
The reality, however, suggests all school districts are not created equal in that regard. In some areas, a well-trained school employee may prove more reliable, and certainly faster on scene, than the rural law enforcement officer who has a lot of territory to cover. While a wealthier, larger school district, such as Fayetteville or Bentonville, might be able to afford a strong force of certified law enforcement officers on campus, smaller districts can't always afford those heavy costs.
Introduction of more guns -- at least those not strapped onto a certified law enforcement officer -- into the school environment ought to be a last resort. Generally speaking, adding guns increases the opportunities for accidents or for a gun to fall into the wrong hands by accident. The margin for error certainly shrinks precipitously.
But if it's your child in a classroom with only a locked door standing between an armed assailant and a massacre, would you in the moment leap at the chance to give an adult in that room a means to protect his or her young charges? A school district in Pennsylvania decided to place 5-gallon buckets of river stones in each classroom so the kids would have something to throw at a shooter. That's better than nothing, but effective?
Borrowing Helder's words, it's also true that strategically putting guns in the hands of some school employees may have the effect of making some people feel safe without actually creating a situation that is indeed safer. That's why school districts need to think long (but not too long) and hard about whether they can afford stronger law enforcement protection. If it can be squeezed into the budget, by all means, do it.
It's also tempting to remind lawmakers and commission members that so many other steps are needed, whether improved background checks, better mental health resources in the schools, limits on gun magazine capacities or banning of so-called bump stocks that make firing semi-automatic rifles extraordinarily fast. But that is not the purview of the school safety commission. They aren't Congress.
Leave it to Helder to make a convincing case for an idea that sounds radical to many. Credit him for an honest evaluation: We doubt you can find many law enforcement officers willing to replace the service weapons on their belts with river stones. They know that force sometimes demands a response of force.
The No. 1 goal is to make it harder for someone bent on violence to kill public school students. A Clarksville approach isn't our preferred choice, but in some circumstances, it certainly ought to be a choice school districts can make.
Commentary on 06/17/2018