Security takes bite of school budget

By Bill Donovan
Staff writer

GALLUP — Not only will the public school district be paying more for gasoline and utilities next year, but the cost to keep the schools safe is also going up.

John Samford, assistant superintendent for finance for the Gallup-McKinley County School District, told the members of the school board Monday that the cost to provide private security at various schools in the county will be almost $250,000 next year.

That led to members of the school board wondering why it’s costing so much for security.

“That’s a lot of money,” said board member Joe DeLaO, “just to have a couple of guys walk down the hallways. We could do a lot with $250,000.”

It’s been increasing, Samford said, about $10,000 a year for the past few years.

He added that there wasn’t a lot the school board could do about this. One suggestion was to have the district run its own security force, but Samford said that would probably cost the district even more money.

The solution would be to have local law enforcement agencies provide the protection at no cost to the district, but police budgets are so tight that none would offer this service.
Dennis Moeckel, who owns and operates Gallup Security Service, which has the contract to provide security services at the various schools in the county, said later during a phone interview that his people do more than just walk the hallways.

“I think we make the schools a lot safer,” he said, “especially in the schools in the county.”

Gallup Security Service has about 30 security officers working the schools during the school year, with guards at almost all of the high schools in the county as well as at Gallup Central and Gallup Junior High and on the buses.

He said his company provides the district the service at $9.75 per hour, as opposed to the $17 an hour that Albuquerque Public Schools pays when it needs extra security personnel. Moeckel said this even includes the cost of providing insurance.

The $250,000 annual cost, he said, is worth it when you look at what’s going on with the youth gangs in the county and the growing problem of drugs. Without the security, schools would have a far greater problem with gangs and drugs than they now have.

The discussion about security came up as the board approved its budget for next year.

The district is projecting $97.3 million in revenue and the same amount for expenditures.

The board members also discussed the fact that the district enrollment has decreased by some 1700 students over the past five years and wondered where they have all gone.

Board member Annie Descheny pointed out that this decrease is costing the district money since the more students the district has, the more state funding it gets.

This is not the first time the board has held this discussion and as in the past, no definite answers were given, although it was brought up that the birth rate in McKinley County is on the decline and the Bureau of Indian Affairs is still providing a boarding school education.

The board also went into executive session for about 20 minutes to discuss an “administration investigation of reports of unethical and or unprofessional conduct by several school employees.”

Afterwards, School Superintendent Ray Arsenault said he couldn’t go into a lot of detail because this all pertains to personnel actions, but he stressed that this sounds a lot worse than it actually was.

“This is really a minor matter,” he said.

It apparently dealt with complaints from some principals that school personnel were not following their orders. A couple of the instances dealt with teachers who refuse to give make-up tests to students who were absent, because of a school activity or other excuse, when the tests were originally given.

This is a sore spot for many teachers because of the increase of students who take the test on the day it is given helping out students who then have to take it by giving out areas that the test covers, or, in some cases, even all of the answers. To get around this teachers have to create an alternative exam.

Arsenault said that disciplinary action was discussed regarding those who were in violation, which could range from “severe” to being required to get counseling. No firings were reported although there was one report of a resignation.