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Tighter rein on parents part of security upgrades at North Texas schools

This is alarmist and crazy. So much for building community relations.

By Dan X. McGraw

Schools across North Texas started the first day of classes Monday with new rules to limit who can come and go during the school day.

Several schools – including in Plano, Mesquite and McKinney – installed security systems to scan visitors' driver's licenses and cross-reference them against sex offender databases.

Known offenders may be escorted off campus or monitored by security personnel.

Some districts have also established stricter rules on where parents can go on campus. At elementary schools in Richardson, for example, parents must say goodbye to their children in designated "hug zones" rather than walk students to classrooms.

"Parents aren't going to be able to sign their name and walk around campus anymore," said Kevin Haller, director of security for the Frisco school district. "Those days are gone."

Many schools bought the scanning equipment from Raptor Technologies Inc., which uses the same technology that once monitored visitors at Enron Corp.

The equipment costs $1,500 per school the first year and about $400 each subsequent year, said Allan Measom, Raptor's president.

It relies on a sex offender database that is updated weekly via the Internet.

The way most systems operate, the results must be verified by a school administrator.

In Irving, the system snagged about a dozen sex offenders last school year, said Pat Lamb, the district's director of security.

Mr. Measom said the system has detected more than 1,100 sex offenders at the nearly 5,000 schools the company monitors. But most were entering for legitimate reasons.

"Most are parents, aunts or grandparents," Mr. Measom said. "They have a reason to be there. But this technology allows officials to know who these people are."

It's up to each district to decide how to handle sex offenders on campus.

In Mesquite, school officials adopted new guidelines that stipulate that students' relatives who are registered offenders must be escorted on school grounds, while other sex offenders are either monitored or escorted off campus, said Ian Halperin, a district spokesman.

"Police have been able to do it for a long time," he said. "This is just bringing it to the schools."

Many districts expanded pilot scanning programs this fall.

In Dallas, four schools employ Raptor, and district officials hope to expand its use, said Jon Dahlander, a Dallas ISD spokesman.

Richardson officials hope to stop any parents from roaming school grounds by requiring them to be buzzed in at two locations before entering.

Tim Clark, a district spokesman, said keeping parents in a designated zone at the beginning and end of the day will also help officials know who is in the building. Still, he said, there is some latitude.

"We will work with parents on it," Mr. Clark said. "This is just about student safety. It is about knowing who is in the building."


— Dan X. McGraw
Dallas Morning News
2008-08-26


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