Comments on SWOPblogger: Opportunity is the answer, not armed security guar...

It is a great idea, So interesting. .................

2008-08-14T03:34:19.973-07:00

It is a great idea, So interesting.
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Nishantha
Social Media Marketing

This can be a great opportunity,sounds interesting...

2008-07-19T06:45:44.088-07:00

This can be a great opportunity,sounds interesting

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sanuja

Addiction Recovery New Mexico

singhalaya

2008-07-19T06:37:03.484-07:00

singhalaya

thanks for the clarification. again, great idea o...

2007-09-19T12:32:59.525-07:00

thanks for the clarification. again, great idea on the funding.

karlos

I was not implying that you were putting words in ...

2007-09-13T21:25:13.423-07:00

I was not implying that you were putting words in people's mouths.

What I was talking about was the people who argue that guns won't raise test scores, won't raise graduation rates, etc.

Nobody ever suggested that they would; those are the words being put in others mouths.

There is only one argument for guns; and that is to be able to shoot people who need to be shot.

Yes, I agree. The needs of children in our state ...

2007-09-11T09:17:36.492-07:00

Yes, I agree. The needs of children in our state must be our first funding priority. I like your idea about the legislature.

If you read my post a little closer, you'll see that I didn't put words in people's mouths, though I may have knocked down a straw man. I rhetorically tried to get away from the debate about guns and move towards a debate about the biggest threat facing the state's children.

I would like to offer a challenge to those who bel...

2007-09-10T20:46:40.083-07:00

I would like to offer a challenge to those who believe that the children in this community lack the proper number of available interventions and preventions. (a position that I support)

I believe that we are underfunding our support for children.

I believe that that problem will be solved by making the needs of children the community's first funding priority.

In the legislature; the first bill that they pass is called the feed bill. It provides money to conduct the session. Funding the session is obviously the legislature's top priority.

I would like to see a positive approach carried to the city council. That proposal is;

every budget year begins with a "feed bill" for our kids.

That bill passes before any other allocations are discussed. Every other funding need competes for what is left over after we meet the needs of our children.

It will focus the debate each year; first on the needs of kids, and then on everything else.

It has been a long time since I saw an argument wh...

2007-09-10T20:38:20.636-07:00

It has been a long time since I saw an argument where more people try to put words in other people's mouths.

I have never heard anyone argue that guns are a solution to any social problem. But I have heard a lot of people argue that they are not a solution to those problems.

Guns serve a purpose that no other tool serves. Guns don't make police officers use guns recklessly. The vast majority of police officers never use their guns in a gunfight.

All of the arguments for other preventions and interventions are spot on. We should be doing everything we can to allow children to escape a life where a gun needs to be pointed at them.

But if those interventions and preventions fall short; it shouldn't be an unarmed police officer that pays the piper.

For those interested in prevention and interventio...

2007-09-10T14:15:16.420-07:00

For those interested in prevention and intervention programs at APS. www.aps.edu

Dear APS Community Member,

Last week the Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education approved the recommendations from the Community Safety Commission. Those recommendations include the creation of an independent police department, including arming all sworn police officers. In the coming weeks, the board will be putting policy changes that reflect its vote last week.

During the many community meetings on this topic, it was asked what prevention and intervention programs APS has in place. In addition to professional counselors in our schools, the APS Health and Wellness Department has a prevention and intervention unit that implements programs and activities in schools.

Here are short descriptions of those programs:

The Mediation in the Schools Program is a part of the overall Violence Prevention Program. In place in all grades, the program teaches skills that students can use throughout their lives as they address conflict. Part of the program includes training students to become peer mediators.

Project Sentry is a Youth Gun Violence Prevention Program focusing on middle and high school students. The focus is to reduce youth-related gun violence. The program educates and encourages pro-social development for our community’s youth through school-based instruction, social skill development and family and community involvement.

Second Step is a violence prevention program targeting elementary through middle school students and is focused on problem solving, impulse control and anger management.

The Positive Action program helps increase positive behavior in schools through classroom lessons. Schools have seen success in decreasing problems in schools.

Promise for Tomorrow is a suicide prevention program for middle and high school students. This program is designed to help students identify the warning signs and resources available for help.

The Families and Schools Together (FAST) program is designed to build protective factors and reduce a number of problems such as school failure, alcohol and drug abuse, violence, delinquency, and child abuse and neglect. FAST builds relationships through ten, weekly, multifamily groups meetings for children of age and their parents.

The Parent Involvement Program (PIP) is an alternative to long-term suspension for drug and alcohol violations. Students and their parents attend evening sessions.

Crossroads Project Success Program is a substance abuse prevention and intervention program for high school students. Students learn about being an adolescent, the effects of alcohol and other drugs, how to deal with family pressures and problems and other coping skills. These are taught during six to eight sessions in health education classes. The program also includes individual and group counseling with students. This program has been in place in APS since 1995.

Project Toward No Tobacco (TNT) Use is a ten-session program designed for middle school students. This program emphasizes the physical consequences of use, and teaching decision-making techniques.

Tobacco Awareness Program (TAP) provides tobacco using teens in middle and high school with information, motivation, and support to successfully stop using cigarettes or tobacco.

If you would like more information on any of these programs, please visit the APS Health and Wellness Department’s website at www.apshmh.com or call the department at 855-9850.

Thank you for your time and support of Albuquerque Public Schools!

Sincerely,

Dr. Elizabeth Everitt, Superintendent

Albuquerque Public Schools

I think I am starting to see why SWOP has such a v...

2007-09-09T08:19:52.202-07:00

I think I am starting to see why SWOP has such a vast influence on dissaffected people.

Rather than a "gangmember" I was labeled as a "rocker".

Rather than shoot heroin, my depressed buddies snorted coke.

Instead of getting arrested for underage drinking or smoking of weed, the NE heights cops let me go with a warning.

When I applied for jobs, I had no criminal record, and was able to get work that was half decent.

I never developed the same hate of the blue uniform, I developed a want to BE a blue uniform.

I'm sorry I never saw this before.

J. Lopez

I take no delight in calling myself a security gua...

2007-09-08T18:01:59.075-07:00

I take no delight in calling myself a security guard when I went through a regional academy and passed the curriculum, and kept my police certification for ten years, but once that certification lapsed, I was a security guard supervisor and safety specialist - so thats why I can claim the "guard" part. How is security a dirty word when Homeland Security is now the hottest, most sought after job in law enforcement?

As to Karlos' thoughts on what is more important - yes, of course, opportunity and hope, along with fairness and equality, are MUCH deeper issues. I hope that we guards or officers or agents or whatever you want to call us use the discretion God gave us to take care of a situation peacefully without involving the police frequently and successfully. We can de-escalate, we can non-violently intervene, as we SHOULD be trained to do. And that keeps that incident under the crime threshold, so no police record or criminalization for that incident mars a kids LIFE.

So what do we dialogue about so that we hit the issues we must for positive change, for opportunity to thrive and freedom from false labels? I am willing to refrain from any what ifs!

J. Lopez - former APS Police Officer, APS Police Radio Dispatcher, APS Police Sergeant, APS Risk Management Safety Specialist, JeffCo Schools Security Supervisor, Charter Vocational Safety and Security Officer/Guard. Disabled.

There are armed police officers and unarmed securi...

2007-09-08T16:33:16.204-07:00

There are armed police officers and unarmed security officers on campus, just to correction. I realize that you folks take delight in calling the school police security, whatever. A point of fact, there are campus, and there will probably always be cops on campus. That is not a bad thing, cops are not the enemy. Unless you're a criminal of course.

J. Lopez,Thanks for the comment.I really don't wan...

2007-09-08T11:43:09.676-07:00

J. Lopez,

Thanks for the comment.

I really don't want to be dragged down these 'what if' scenarios anymore. That debate's been had. And you won. I want to move on to the bigger debate that the district should be having.

And we too want to be on the same side. Framing this as "Shiites and Sunnis, of Hutu and Tutsi?" is an extreme, historically incorrect analogy, though. Our interests are with the young people, and with workers in the district. We'd definitely be on your side in a contract/labor/wage fight. In fact, we compromised during the last round of this debate in 2001. Security officers are allowed to have guns under the current policy - they're locked away for after hours and in case of emergency. Security officers said they wanted to be armed because of the threat of break-ins during after school hours.

I know, I know...locked away doesn't help during an emergency, you say. But if you're prepared, as you said, it shouldn't matter. We have a major difference of opinion. Guns, we think, escalate rather than deescalate in the heat of the moment. I guarantee back up if you ever need it - not only from APD but the community. The heroic thing is to deescalate.

But I'm telling you, we shouldn't be talking about this until we have a debate about the bigger threats facing the district's children. I'm asking you, what's the bigger threat? Lack of opportunity and hope? Or the threat of some unlikely event? You know what it is. You've been on those campuses. You're a part of this community. I'll back you up for better wages if you back us up for more books. Let's quit this discussion about more arms.

One more thought - if site based management can be...

2007-09-08T09:46:33.417-07:00

One more thought - if site based management can be truly used to its full potential, how would it be to pick seven teachers froma high school who were there the year before, and give them each two periods where they do security duties instead of teach? One "security prep period" could be for updating emergency plans and remidiating safety issues like slips trips and falls. The other priod is spent patroling - managing by walking around, I used to call it. If the teacher on duty needs help, the teacher with the prep goes to help, and calls for District Security if needed. A few EAs can go half security, half teaching.

Put the teachers and EAs picked for the safety brigade in a one week training with the rest of the District security folk so they can learn non-violent intervention and other safety specific procedures and tactics. They would need critical incident managaement and safety remediation training too.

Then, "security" is just part of the school, part of the community.

J. Lopez - former security officer

Creating opportunity and hope does not have to be...

2007-09-08T08:43:44.523-07:00

Creating opportunity and hope does not have to be exclusive of procedures and personnel to help kids stay alive in emergencies. I would feel like utter boiled crap if a school I was supposed to be providing security for had a violent incident i SHOULD HAVE PLANNED FOR. Yes, it might not happen but once a year, but the security people should at least have a dim clue of what to do when the unthinkable happens.

I have been armed and unarmed at schools, and I can say that I have been just as effective in both cases. (And that effectiveness varies with the day and time - security people are human just like anyone else). The only difference was, you were right, my level of comfort with the "what if"s. I think a healthy fear of our Constitution's provision for the people to rise up against tyranny should reign in the overzealous among my blue uniformed brothers and sisters, but it sometimes is not enough.

I can see how a person who only has had bad experiences with cops and security to think that arming them would be beyond bad. But just as you are trying to show that overall society needs to recognize the value of every youth, can you have a litte hope in your heart for us poor security schmuks too? We like hope and prosperity and Justice, too, really!

I have always advocated for more training for security people, not the kind where they become marksmen or learn how to rip your spleen out with a pinky, but how to listen and learn, how to adapt to and overcome obstacles to peace.

If we do more than give lip service to our ideals, which are the same - Justice, Rule of Law, Equality, Freedom, ... Why are the security people and the SWOP people not one and the same group? Why do we divide ourselves like some twisted mirror of Shiites and Sunnis, of Hutu and Tutsi? I am all about more jobs for poor people, better ones where we can actually pay our rent and feed out family. I AM a poor person, so are most of the guards I know. We are the same people - we have dna that proves Lucy of Africa was all of our Great GREAT (repeat lots)Grandmother.

And it changes nothing, as Cain and Abel, the most close of relatives, from Adam and Eve after the tree of knowledge had been eaten from, proved. But there is hope for us - we must have faith in one another, in our fellow man and LITERAL cousins of all races and creeds, and dare I say - professions?

J. Lopez - former security guard