Resource officer is critical post

Recently Lake Zurich school District 95 presented a number of proposed budget cuts. One of these cuts involved eliminating funding for the Lake Zurich High School resource officer. The school resource officer (SRO) plays an integral role not only as a liaison between the school district and the police department, but also as an immediate first responder, a source of invaluable information for emergency planning and a person who has developed trusting relationships with students and faculty. This type of trust is occurs over a lengthy period of time and would pay dividends in a critical incident. As a parent and a public safety professional who has trained hundreds of police command officers in critical incident response, I'm concerned about the immediate and long-term impact of this cut. Let's not put ourselves in a position to short change the safety of our most valuable resource, our children.

George Filenko

Lake Zurich