The accidental discharge of a youth resource officer’s firearm in April isn’t leading School Committee members to consider removing the police employees from schools as neighboring Somerville did, and a police official said the officers won’t go unarmed.
A panel of Cambridge Police Department officials – all people who grew up in the city and went to Cambridge Public Schools – reported to the School Committee on Tuesday to explain the incident and the department’s school program.
“The incident was significant and unacceptable,” said David Murphy, chief operating officer of Cambridge Public Schools. “I don’t believe the school department could ask for anything more than what we received from the police department, [whose] response has been thorough, their response has been substantive.”
Officer Frank Greenidge, who fired the weapon inside a single-person restroom at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School. While on a bathroom break, violated protocol by removing his gun from his holster and placing it on a hook, caused the weapon to fire when he went to unhook it, police said. Greenidge notified the police department and school district immediately. He remains on administrative leave.
Public raises idea of removal
In public comment before the discussion, two Cambridge residents expressed their disappointment in Cambridge’s response to the incident, and advocated for the removal of police officers and guns from Cambridge Public Schools.
“Things could have gone terribly wrong and I was disappointed and frustrated by the district’s handling of it and wanting to sweep things under the rug,” said Ellen Wong, parent of a high school student. “Police, policing and guns have no place in our schools.”
Wong suggested diverting funding for officers toward counselors and social workers instead. Wong, along with parent Luba Feigenberg, pointed toward Somerville Public Schools as a model, as the district recently removed School Resource Officers from its campuses.
“Research overwhelmingly suggests that having police officers in schools has no positive impact on student safety, and may in reality make students less safe,” Feigenberg said.
Drop in youth arrests
A police memo said the incident has inspired additional training for the officers, who are nationally accredited before being placed in a school. There will also be more outreach between the officers and school community, Murphy said.
Youth resource officers, which the police department funds and is required to have by state law, work primarily to divert students away from the justice system whenever possible. Murphy said officers are not allowed to be involved in school disciplinary actions.
For potentially criminal issues it was critical that youth resource officers are stationed in schools and develop relationships with students and faculty, said James Barrett, director of clinical support services for Cambridge police. “When youth have committed an arrestable offense, or chargeable offense – as a community, we’re able to divert that child,” part of effort resulting in a roughly 80 percent drop in arrests of Cambridge kids over the past 15 years, Barrett said.
While members of the School Committee recommended increased communication about the resource officers’ role, multiple members commended the police on the program.
“It is really, really impressive how much you have nearly eliminated the youth arrest rate,” said member Rachel Weinstein.
“I think this is a model program,” member Richard Harding said. “To have a community where at times you have zero Cambridge kids arrested and put in the juvenile justice system speaks volumes.”
Unarmed presence
Despite their support for the program, members Rachel Weinstein and member David Weinstein (no relation) asked for clarification from Murphy and the police department on how Somerville was able to remove resource officers from schools. When Rachel Weinstein hoped to follow up on what Somerville had done toward diversion, considering the removal, Mayor E. Denise Simmons, as chair of the committee, treated it dismissively. “With all due respect, I’m not terribly interested in what Somerville does, because I think we are the model,” Simmons said.
Harding also asked police commissioner Christine Elow whether an officer could staff the schools unarmed, or if state law forbids it.
It would be too dangerous for officers – whose uniforms make them potential targets for violence – to be without a gun, she said.
“An officer responding out on the street without their firearm — What are the implications of that?” Elow said. “We wouldn’t have officers in the schools without firearms, I think that’s just the long and short of it.”
The city is working on its own unarmed Community Safety Department, now in a delayed rollout that is tying it in more closely with the police department’s emergency dispatcher system, and considering whether there will be a role for a resident-organized alternative to police, the Holistic Emergency Assistance Response Team. Police officials pointed toward a school-related role for Heart and the department’s Community Assistance Response and Engagement team.
“Care and possibly Heart might be additional resources for our school community,” Elow said, followed by Cambridge police superintendent Frederick Cabral: “Care and Heart do have a role. But when it comes to diverting our young people from the juvenile justice system, it’s very limited,” he said, because only actual police officers will be able to see an at-risk kid through a court-based diversion. “A member of heart or care is not going to have any jurisdiction or authority to do something like that.”
“Our YROs, especially, see themselves as gatekeepers to the criminal justice system,” said Frederick Cabral, superintendent for Cambridge police.
Student support for program
Student representatives on the School Committee shared their support for the program, and asked for more communication from the department so students understand how it works.
“I feel really confident in this program, and I’m glad to understand better the work that you guys are doing,” said student member Jeanne Alailima. “I think it would just be very beneficial for students to have this communicated to them.”
Alailima suggested hosting a student panel with the youth resource officers.
“People really care deeply about the presence of police officers,” student member Naseem Anjaria said. “And I think people really do genuinely want to learn more.”
A stronger
Please consider making a financial contribution to maintain, expand and improve Cambridge Day.
We are now a 501(c)3 nonprofit and all donations are tax deductible.
Please consider a recurring contribution.
“We are the model” and can’t learn anything from Somerville? That’s a very disappointing comment from Mayor Simmons.
Sooooo…..not only did he break protocol by placing the gun on the hook by the finger guard …. THE SAFETY WAS OFF….in a school….in a program that is ostensibly oriented towards helping the children.
“Inspired additional training” indeed…..
“don’t believe the school department could ask for anything more than what we received from the police department” Is crazy.
You could ask that they don’t shoot guns in schools for one thing…
You could also ask that the officer who did so be fired, or at very least be placed on unpaid leave while the process takes place, instead “He remains on administrative leave.”
Also how is something “required to have by state law” but the next municipality over was allowed to not do it? The lack of reflection on alternative models because “I think we are the model” is absurd, given this whole conversation is happening in response to a cop shooting a gun in a school. If that’s the model it’s a terrible model. Time to look at alternative ones.
If cops cannot be in schools without guns, and cannot avoid shooting their guns in schools, they simply have no place in them.
So much absolute BS here. Seems par for the course when it comes to defenders of police violence.
No one should be carrying guns in school, as evidenced by one going off in the high school because of user incompetence. It really should not be a debatable issue