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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: LindyBill who wrote (23122)	1/5/2004 11:41:01 PM
From: gamesmistress	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 793672

"It's necessary because there are people who bring weapons to school," Edwin said. "It's not a safe environment." January 5, 2004 Police Task Force Dispatched to Unruly New York Schools By ELISSA GOOTMAN A task force of 150 police officers will help impose order on 12 of New York City's most violent schools under a new initiative announced today by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg to curb school violence. Together, the 12 schools enroll less than 3 percent of the city's 1.1 million schoolchildren. But through Nov. 30, they accounted for 13 percent of all serious crimes reported this school year and 11 percent of total incidents in the city schools, officials said. The list of schools, compiled over the winter break by the Department of Education, the Police Department and the teachers' and principals' unions, includes 10 high schools and 2 middle schools, concentrated in Brooklyn and the Bronx. Poverty rates at the schools range from under 20 percent at Canarsie High School, in Brooklyn, to nearly 90 percent at Junior High School 22 in the Bronx. "For too long, we've slowly found ourselves sinking further and further into a pit where anything is tolerated, where the teachers don't have a safe environment, where the teachers can't do their job and the students can't learn," Mr. Bloomberg said at a news conference at City Hall. "We brought crime down in the city — everybody said it couldn't be done. There's no reason why we can't bring crime down in the schools." The Department of Education, now under mayoral control, has been under intense pressure from the teachers' and principals' unions to address the issue of school violence, and they praised Mr. Bloomberg's action yesterday. But the mayor took on the issue only after reports that the suspension system had broken down in the course of his restructuring of the school system and that, as a result, violent students were languishing in their schools. City officials said the 12 schools named today were also trouble spots last year, when they had, on average, six times as many assaults as other high schools and nearly seven times as many weapons incidents. Their attendance rates are below average and their suspension rates are generally above average, although officials said that in some cases, low suspension rates had prompted concerns. Several of the schools are severely overcrowded, partly because of transfers from large, failing schools that have been broken down into smaller schools. In about a month, Mr. Bloomberg said, the Police Department would create the police task force, which will initially focus on the 12 schools. In the meantime, each school has receive one or two additional police officers, and today the schools were flooded with officers from regular patrols. The 12 schools will also get more school safety officers, the mayor said. As soon as the list was made public, however, it generated questions about how the schools had been selected. In a telephone conference call, Department of Education officials described the list as a fluid one that could and would change with time. All 12 schools were among the most dangerous 15 percent of schools, they said. Within that larger group, schools were chosen based on qualitative analysis. Starting today, teams including police captains and Education Department supervisors will examine the 12 schools to find additional ways to improve security. The streets near Washington Irving High School were lined today with blue school safety cars and vans, and a sport utility vehicle from the Manhattan South Task Force. Edwin Diaz, 14, a freshman, said he and other students had been called into an auditorium where a school safety officer informed them of the new security measures. "He said it's going to be like a police precinct in here from now on," Edwin said. But he did not object. "It's necessary because there are people who bring weapons to school," Edwin said. "It's not a safe environment."