50 Toronto high schools will be assigned officers when classes begin

Last Updated: Monday, June 29, 2009 | 6:55 PM ET Comments1Recommend3CBC News

Twenty more Toronto public high schools will each get a police officer on a
full-time basis when students return to class in the fall, bringing the
total number of schools with officers to 50, the police chief said Monday.

Last September, 30 high schools across the city were each assigned a police
officer who worked full-time with students, and an additional 20 schools
will each get an officer under the School Resource Officer program for the
2009-10 academic year, Chief Bill Blair said.

The program was the result of the Toronto District School Board's plan to
increase school safety following a 2008 report on school violence by Toronto
lawyer Julian Falconer, who headed a school community safety advisory panel
established after the fatal shooting of Jordan Manners at C.W. Jefferys
Collegiate Institute in May 2007.

The report made more than 100 recommendations, including buying sniffer dogs
that would seek out guns in student lockers and other hiding places.

On Monday, Blair said having officers in schools has produced results, such
as a drop in the number of criminal charges, but he said that's not the
point of the program.

"We're not going to measure our success by the number of charges laid or
drugs and weapons seized. The success of these programs is to prevent crime
and prevent victimization," he said.

While Blair said officers in schools forge ties with students, not everyone
is convinced. Toronto Beaches/East York trustee Sheila Cary-Meagher opposes
having officers in the two public high schools in her area, Ward 16.

"It isn't the only answer, and I really resent that people think because
there is a cop it will be hunky dory," she said.

But the majority of trustees, parents and principals support the plan
because students tell them they feel safer, according to the heads of both
the Toronto public and Catholic school boards.

"It can be kind of intimidating at first," said Daniel Kim, a Grade 11
student who learned an officer will be at Earl Haig Secondary School in
September. "But if we see him every day we can accept him."