The evening of 2023-06-13 was a meeting of the Honeoye Falls-Lima Board of Education (BoE).
Much like Lima last week, HFL had a Public Hearing on a School Resource Deputy. While there were comments, nothing stuck out as being significantly different from last week. In other words, there are various issues with the current plan being implemented long term. And there are various detail related questions that will need to be answered. But for a first year? I haven’t heard anyone say no to the idea. The finances, well that’s another story.
The cost to the District would be $28k, while they would be paying ~$30k for an SSP. I’m not sure exactly how to define an SSP, apart from that they aren’t armed and aren’t current police. I think they are retired police, so they have skills in that field. From that, it seems like an obvious move for the District. Save a little bit of money and get ‘more’.
Per this Board’s normal practice, no decision tonight. They do a first ‘read’, then decide at future meetings. Although I got the impression this counted as a zeroth read, so no decision for two meetings? Either way, nothing decided tonight.
I did make the comment that, if the District really wants to discourage attacks, they need to get more guns on campus and make it unknown who has them. If the hypothetical attacker is too worried about looking over their shoulder, they may go elsewhere. Which isn’t great, but I suspect we would all find that a better outcome. And all the Board has to do to get to that point is make it abundantly clear adults on campus (staff, parents, visitors, etc) are encouraged to exercise their God given rights. I think their Oath of Office gives them legal justification to do so, if they so choose. I doubt they will, past experiences have me thinking they don’t have the backbone for such a stance. But I like to be wrong.
Additions for the Alumni Hall of Fame were approved. I didn’t catch the names, but wouldn’t share them even if I had. It was requested to keep them ‘secret’ for now. Which I find incredibly amusing, as the request came in a public meeting, which is being broadcast live and recorded for future viewing.
Graduation is coming up on June 25th, 2PM at RIT.
The District is looking at installing Vape sensors in all the High School bathrooms. There is currently one in place, as a test case. I have no real opinion on that, but it came up in discussion that HFL has a ‘Drug and Alcohol Specialist’. Which I find rather concerning. Either the problem is bad enough to justify that position, or there has been that much administrative bloat. Both are bad, if for different reasons. I’d rather the bloat, because that’s less directly harmful to the kids. But I suspect it’s that many kids on drugs. Apparently the drug of choice is ‘vapes’, or to directly quote Gene (Superintendent) “Vapes are Everywhere”.
As an aside, I do find the concerns around drugs somewhat ironic. When I was High School age, I knew many people that at least dabbled in drugs. Alcohol and Marijuana being the two most prevalent. In time, they (mostly) grew up. And from what I’ve heard from my parents, it was similar for them. Every generation uses drugs when they are young, and then tries to stop their kids from making the same mistake. Yet here we are, continuing the cycle.
The Code of Conduct was approved, with some changes from feedback received previously. Some of the changes look to have been based on my suggestions, at least what I considered the more important ones. Not necessarily in the way I would have made the changes, but that almost doesn’t matter. The District listened to feedback and adjusted accordingly. The process has been described as ‘sausage making‘. If anyone involved thinks the end result is perfect, then something has gone wrong in the process. Or that person has a very different idea of ‘perfect’.
And those are my Observations From Audience Land for the June 13, 2023 meeting of the Honeoye Falls-Lima Board of Education.
Agenda’s and similar information can be found at HFL’s BoardDocs page. While a recording will likely be available soon.