Metal Detectors Will Soon Be Used At Every Broward Public School
MIAMI (CBSMiami) - Broward County public school students should prepare to face random searches with hand-held metal detectors.
It is part of the district's push to keep students and staff safe on campus.
It is pretty much a done deal. There was not much disagreement at the Broward workshop on Wednesday afternoon. They will do a formal vote next Wednesday and in the coming weeks, we will see the metal wands at every public school.
Broward public schools will soon be putting metal detectors in every school to randomly search student backpacks and purses in classrooms.
"This is an additional layer on top of what we are currently doing as we further the discussion," said Interim Superintendent Vickie Cartwright.
Most board members are in favor, including Lori Alhadeff, who lost her daughter Alyssa during the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School massacre four years ago.
"At the end of the day, we need to prevent weapons, knives, guns from getting into our schools. And the random metal detection is one way we can go about doing that," said Alhadeff.
"I call it band-aids and there is no security in Broward County schools," said Reggie Gonzalez, who is a clerk at a local high school.
She does not believe the random approach will work. She favors full metal detectors.
"It is about what we are not doing and why are we doing all these things that really don't work," she added.
Debbie Hixon, who lost her husband in the MSD shooting, says wands are a start. Full metal detectors pose a problem for her.
"It is just not realistic for what we have. Is the possibility of having portable walk-through metal detectors which is something that maybe we will be looking at. That was originally what my discussion was back in 2018," said Hixon.
The formal final vote next week will launch the pilot program at some schools. A slow rollout and soon every school will have them. What they are discussing right now is guidance so no student is targeted at any location.
