By James Lomuscio
Westport’s Representative Town Meeting (RTM) voted 30 to 1 tonight to approve a $743,114 Board of Education appropriation request for mass notification and two-way radio systems as part of a system wide security initiative for the town’s eight schools.
Elio Longo, school business director, said the mass communication system, which would broadcast word of emergencies through the fire alarm systems, including interior and exterior speakers, as well as have emergency lockdown buttons, has a cost of $480,000 to be offset by an $86,982 state grant.
He said the two-way radio system, a highly complex setup involving digital walkie-talkies, 190 hand sets, and Motorola repeaters that allow communications between schools, carries a cost $262,484 offset by a $54,360 grant.
RTM member Peter Knight of District 8 was the lone dissenter, arguing that the town will have spent more than $1 million on security in the wake of the 2012 Newtown shootings, instead of less costly intervention efforts to prevent internal threats.
The school system last summer, at the advice of Kroll Security Advisors contracted in 2013, installed in all schools new internal door locks costing $200,000 and spent $500,000 for first floor glass film to prevent external attacks.
“We have taken a sledge hammer to crack a nut here,” said Knight, adding that he has great respect for the town’s first responders who have been working with the schools on security updates.
The majority disagreed.
Neil Phillips of District 2, said that RTM’s Education Committee voted unanimously in favor of the appropriation, pointing out that first responders at the meeting “said we should have had these systems even before Sandy Hook.”
The appropriation also received favorable reviews from the RTM’s Finance and Public Protection committees.
Speaking for the committees, Allen Bomes of District 7, noted that subsequent security projects will be of a smaller, less costly scale funded by the Board of Education’s operating budget.
“Communication might be the most important thing of the whole (security effort),” said RTM member Jack Klinge, who is a substitute teacher in the school system.
Klinge also reiterated a comment made earlier by RTM member Carla Rea.
Even with the new, digital two-way radios said to be a vast improvement over the analog walkie-talkies now in use, Rea expressed concerns that there are dead spots in the schools where the students might not be able to use their cell phones.
“You’re absolutely correct; some further study is needed for Wi-Fi,” Longo told Rea.
“We will communicate our needs to Verizon and service providers,” Longo later told Klinge.
The issue of poor cell phone service at Staples High School is not a new one. Emergency planners for several years have complained that inadequate cell phone service could hamper emergency shelter operations at the school.
In making his pitch to the RTM, Schools Superintendent Elliott Landon stressed that this third security measure would ensure a safer environment.
“If this money is appropriated, we will be in a place where our staff and children will be protected as much as they can be protected from outside threats,” Landon said.
“When all is said and done, we will be in a much better place than other districts.
“Our kids deserve to be in the safest of places,” he added.
According to Michael Gordon, school board chairman, the communication systems are the final part of the first of three phases that have been recommended by Kroll.
Phase II involves hiring a school system security director, a job for Theodore Hunyadi, director of facilities, and Phase III will involve his recommendations for working closely with police and fire officials.
