The Arkansas School Safety Commission continues to fine tune its recommendations, which are due to Gov. Asa Hutchinson later this year.
The governor reinstated the commission on June 10 in the aftermath of the horrendous grade school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. Nineteen students and two teachers died in that school shooting incident.
The Arkansas commission's original report, issued in March 2018, carried 30 recommendations that public schools were urged but not required to adopt.
Last week, commissioners unanimously approved proposals from its five standing subcommittees. Included is the recommendation for an armed presence on every school campus in Arkansas.
That particular recommendation came from the commission's subcommittee on law enforcement and security.
Other subcommittees are addressing mental health and prevention; audits, emergency operations plans and drills; physical securities; and intelligence and communication.
The commission is also surveying Arkansas school districts as to what their safety needs are. So far, at least 210 districts have responded while 51 districts had not as of mid-August.
When the Arkansas Legislature concluded its recent special session, lawmakers agreed to transfer $50 million in state surplus funds to a restricted reserve fund to provide grants for implementing recommendations made by the reinstated school safety commission.
Gov. Hutchinson, who asked for the funds transfer, expects the money to go to schools as grants for upgrades in security or to address particular recommendations from the commission.
The proposed armed presence on campus may be provided by law enforcement personnel or by commissioned school security officers in Arkansas.
Some state school districts have opted to train and arm willing school personnel for the duty. The practice has been controversial but reduces costs.
While the prospect of an armed presence in each building on every campus has gotten a lot of attention, the recommendations under development are wide ranging.
Others include:
• Allowing exterior and interior doors to be closed and locked during school hours (except during transitional periods or in case of a fire emergency).
• Making school security cameras accessible by select individuals, including law enforcement, during a critical incident.
• Having school districts do routine safety checks to ensure safety policies and procedures are being followed.
• Recognizing the Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training (ALERRT) as the standard training for all law enforcement officers and commissioned school security officers in Arkansas.
• Requiring all school staff who interact regularly with students to take at minimum the free online one-hour mental health basic awareness class if they haven't gone through training in youth mental health first aid.
The commission is currently charged with reviewing its 2018 report and providing an update on the status of school safety across Arkansas.
While the $50 million in grant funds provided in the special session will address some immediate school safety needs, this is a longer-term challenge for the state.
Hutchinson, whose term as governor expires in January, has said he anticipates the Legislature will make more money available to school districts next year.
Particular school needs and the final recommendations of the school safety commission should all be better known by then.
That is also when the state's lawmakers will have to take a closer look at the adequacy of all public school funding, which will necessarily include the teacher pay issues that the current governor and Legislature ignored in the recently concluded special session.
While the Legislature did set aside the $50 million for school safety grants, Hutchinson refused to add teacher pay to the call, asserting that lawmakers weren't willing to take it up.
What they were willing to do was cut the rate of state income taxes, mostly for higher-income Arkansans, and thereby reducing the balance available for future state needs like, say, teacher pay.