With each new school year comes new faces, schedules, subject matters and experiences. For Miller Middle School, the 2023-2024 school year comes with a new school resource officer, too.
Durango Police Chief Bob Brammer said at a joint meeting with Durango City Council and Durango School District 9-R that the police department added another school resource officer to its roster, increasing DPD’s presence and security in city schools.
The new SRO, Officer Nathan Scott, has been assigned to Miller Middle School, Brammer said.
Scott joins officers Leonard Martinez, who is assigned to Durango High School, and Jim Martindale, who is assigned to Needham, Park and Riverview elementary schools.
DPD’s main goal with its SRO program is to provide a greater visual presence at schools. Having officers in front of schools daily where they arrive to greet students and staff provides a greater sense of safety and reduces crime on campus, Brammer said.
School resource officers also allow Durango police to implement a restorative justice program for students who commit crimes, he said.
School resource officers can place them into a diversion program designed to help students reconnect with their families and community, repair harm they have caused and explore their interests.
“The program helps reduce recidivism of crimes and keeps youth out of the criminal justice system,” Brammer said. “The SRO program continues to work with Kathy Morris, our 9-R safety director, and her school security teams to help facilitate lockdown drills and fire drill responses with our fire partners and during other campus emergencies.”
Brammer said Durango police only has SROs at schools within city limits. For example Escalante Middle School lies outside of the city boundaries at 141 Baker Lane. However, the police department has plans to extend its SRO program to Escalante should the school be incorporated into city limits.
Brammer said the police department is looking to expand and improve other community safety programs under SRO efforts, such as holding more bicycle rodeos at more schools in town.
DPD is also expanding threat assessment training with the school district and Fort Lewis College. The training is meant to help officers and school staff identify concerning behaviors in students or ex-students and interfere with in-school or after-school management, Brammer said.
“Nationally, that’s the problem that we’re seeing,” he said. “Sometimes, it’s the kids that are in school, but typically it’s the returning students or the students that have exited the school, escaped the system and are no longer under the watchful eye of our administrators.”
Brammer said collaboration between the school district and DPD has been “instrumental in maintaining a safe and secure space where students can thrive, learn and develop.”
9-R Superintendent Karen Cheser said Safe 2 Tell, an anonymous early intervention resource for reporting problematic behaviors or criminal activities to law enforcement, is another DPD program that is working well.
“They are very responsive to all of those tips right away,” she said.
cburney@durangoherald.com
