Christian County school board members approved contracts with the local sheriff and police departments to provide law enforcement officers for school resource officers for the 2022-2023 school year.
Assistant Superintendent of Operations Josh Hunt asked the board at Thursday night’s meeting to approve the contract with the Christian County Sheriff’s Department to provide an additional deputy to serve as a school resource officer in order to cover all the elementary schools.
click to download audioHe noted the contact with the sheriff’s department which includes the four school resource officers is from July 1, 2022 to June 31, 2023, for a total cost of $210,000. The cost for the Hopkinsville Police Department to provide five officers to serve as school resource officers is $300,483.
As part of the district’s plan moving forward, Hunt said it is their goal to add school safety officers on each campus.
click to download audioSuperintendent Chris Bentzel said their objective is to have a school resource officer or school safety officer on each of the 13 campuses by August 10th. He went on to say they have decided to go with one entity and the district won’t be using the Hopkinsville Police Department the following year.
click to download audioIn other action, the board approved a new board policy for the district for what Bentzel described as an “open border policy” for students.
click to download audioThe school board also approved the purchase of four buses for just over $394,000, and an invoice for around $505,650 to Hafer Architects for work done so far on the new consolidated high school.
