The Department of Justice announced that it awarded more than $85.3 million to bolster school security-including funding to educate and train students and faculty-and support first responders who arrive on the scene of a school shooting or other violent incident.
"These federal resources will help to prevent school violence and give our students the support they need to learn, grow, and thrive," said Attorney General William P. Barr. "By training faculty, students and first responders, and by improving school security measures, we can make schools and their communities safer."
"There is no more important cause than protecting our children from harm," stated Western District of Louisiana U.S. Attorney David C. Joseph. "These grants will give Caddo Parish School Board the tools to develop better safety measures to help prevent violence in their schools. I want to thank the Department of Justice for making these grants available to provide Louisiana schools with the resources to better identify threats, train crisis teams, and put reporting systems in place. School should always be a safe place for children to learn."
Under BJA's STOP School Violence Prevention and Mental Health Training Program, Caddo Parish School Board received $250,000. The Louisiana Commission on Law Enforcement received an additional $500,000.
President Trump signed the STOP School Violence Act into law in March 2018, authorizing grants that are designed to improve threat assessments, train students and faculty to provide tips and leads, and prepare law enforcement officers and emergency professionals to respond to school shootings and other violent incidents.
This Article was published in the October 25th issue of The Inquisitor.