As the Longmont City Council Member who introduced the motion to postpone the execution of Longmont's IGA with the St. Vrain Valley School District to provide police officers to staff the School Resource Program until a data-founded report on the outcomes could be prepared, and to give members of the public time to speak their experiences about the program, I object to the language in the reporting of this article.
"The work of SROs was questioned by members of city council in February in the wake of fears officers may be targeting minority students for tickets and arrests. Both Denver Public Schools and the Boulder Valley School District have opted to remove SROs from their campuses over complaints that minority students were unfairly singled out by in-school police."
This writing imputes motivation to members of Council that is not present, and that is more appropriate to an editorial than to a news article. Mr. Whaley and I have never discussed my motives, and to my knowledge he made no attempt to contact me before printing this article.
In fact, I have no fears that officers are targeting children of color. Among my constituents are parents who passionately support the program as well as parents who feel their children are not treated fairly. My motivation was to give them a chance to speak, and to make sure that Longmont has a policy of continuous improvement in fulfilling this critically important duty.
It is for SVVSD to decide whether the program continues or not, but it is for Longmont to ensure that the best officers for the job are staffing it while it does continue. I would add that at the time I introduced the delay I was unaware that the Boulder Valley School District is sunsetting their program.
Marcia Martin,
Longmont city councilmember
