Fontana, Calif., schools get high-powered rifles

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press

Fontana, Calif., schools get high-powered rifles
By GILLIAN FLACCUS, Associated Press | January 23, 2013 | Updated: January 24, 2013 1:17am

FONTANA, Calif. (AP) — The high-powered semiautomatic rifles recently shipped to school police in this Southern California city look like they belong on a battlefield rather than in a high school, but officials here say the weapons could help stop a massacre like the one that claimed the lives of 26 students and educators in Connecticut just weeks ago.

Fontana Unified School District police purchased 14 of the Colt LE6940 rifles last fall, and they were delivered the first week of December — a week before the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Over the holiday break, the district's 14 school police officers received 40 hours of training on the rifles. Officers check them out for each shift from a fireproof safe in the police force's main office.

Fontana isn't the first district to try this. Other Southern California districts also have rifle programs — some that have been in operation for several years. Fontana school police Chief Billy Green said he used money from fingerprinting fees to purchase the guns for $14,000 after identifying a "critical vulnerability" in his force's ability to protect students. The officers, who already wear sidearms, wouldn't be able to stop a shooter like the one in Connecticut, he said Wednesday.

"They're not walking around telling kids, 'Hurry up and get to class' with a gun around their neck," the chief said. "Parents need to know that if there was a shooter on their child's campus that was equipped with body armor or a rifle, we would be limited in our ability to stop that threat to their children."


Read more: http://www.chron.com/news/crime/article/Fontana-Calif-schools-get-high-powered-rifles-4216715.php

[Fearless]

1. Fucking idiots.

[AAO]

17. This is what they'll be walking through school with: l

[Fearless]

20. There are prison guards less heavily armed.

[AAO]

21. So now we get to desensitize kids to guns as young as 4 or 5.

There's something really wrong with the united states of Ammunition.

[Fearless]

22. Very very wrong.

Think of the message it tells children. And think of the actual problems in those schools that they're trying to fix with large guns. What happens if a student gets hold of one of these things? Or if someone actually does start shooting and the officer hits several students with the rifle?

And then there's the bigger issue... In what world is this considered an acceptable environment for bringing up children?

[Socal31]

2. There were always D.A.R.E. police on my campus growing up.

I was at a Blue Ribbon elementary school, and at a high-school where there was a full time police officer.

These rifles are unnecessary only due to their unwieldiness in a close-quarters battle.

All schools need are plain-clothed officers so that they are not target #1 for a wacko.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

3. Do the cops wander around with these things?

From the article:
"The officers split their time between 44 schools in the district and keep the rifles in a safe at their assigned school or secured in their patrol car each day before checking the weapon back in to the school police headquarters each night."

It sounds like they get the rifle from a central armory, go to their assigned school, lock the rifle in a safe or in the trunk of the car, then do their normal routine. At the end of the day, they collect the rifle from the school's safe, and tote it back to the central armory.

Maybe I'm reading it wrong, since I don't see the usefulness. If someone assaults the school, they yell "Wait! I have to get the rifle out of the trunk!"

[Sherman A1]

4. I just don't see this as helpful

I do not see more guns as the answer.

[Ferretherder]

5. Don't worry, the only reason you feel that way is...

...more guns is NOT the answer!

To quote Fearless, 'fucking idiots!'

[Sherman A1]

7. Thanks

I thought it was just me...

[Ferretherder]

8. You're welcome...

...and, no, it ain't just you.

And I hope it's a hell of a lot more than we think!

[hack89]

16. At least the guns are in the hands of trained law enforcement officers.

a better investment would be stronger physical security for schools.

[Nihil]

36. Hmmm ...

> At least the guns are in the hands of trained law enforcement officers.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014373367

[hack89]

37. Either we trust cops with guns or we don't

if we don't then they all need to be disarmed as a danger to society.

[barbtries]

6. i'd be pulling my kid out of that school.

i won't have guns in my home, i should let my kids go to school under these circumstances?

i'm so glad my kids are grown.

[plethoro]

19. Me too. I would already have made the preliminaries so I could get them

out quickly. I am glad my daughter is grown and decided not to have children. Few in my neighborhood are having children.

[Auntie Bush]

32. My daughter doesn't want children either.

Stuff like sandy Hook just reinforces her decision.

[The Wizard]

9. Time bombs

in search of clocks.

[zonkers]

10. Experience tells me bad idea. School property gets stolen all the time.

At least it did in every school I went to and my teacher friends tauht at. It just happens.

[Javaman]

11. This won't end well. nt

[Nihil]

12. O i A

[heaven05]

13. pitiful

adult behavior. Newtown is an excuse for these ,,,,,?????? to have high powered weapons, the round will go through a body to who knows where, inside a school. Reactionary Americans are a laughing stock to me. What a fucking joke!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!And I'm not laughing.

[marions ghost]

14. Gun nuts won that one...

So backward.

[sinkingfeeling]

15. I cannot see how having these rifles could possibly help if they aren't being carried,

loaded, through the hallways of the schools. Waste of money.

[Auntie Bush]

33. But look at all he money gun sales made...so it's worth it.

not!

[They_Live]

18. The schools should be required

to purchase accidental death & dismemberment insurance that covers EVERY STUDENT as well. Maybe the economic reality of that kind additional investment would slow down this ridiculous arms race.

[Trillo]

23. One more ratchet closer to concentration camps. Are they there Yet?

Zero-tolerance for micro-behaviors? Check.
Tall chain-link fences? Check.
Video surveillance? Check.
Forced labor? Check, Kaching.
Fingerprints? Check, fee charged, Kaching.
RFID tags? Check.
High-powered rifles? Check.

So glad the jailers educators won't be getting my kids, but it's little consolation, for others' kids are subject to all these authoritarian fundamentalists, which is about the best honest characterization possible, and the worst, well we can look to humankind's history....

[AverageJoe90]

24. The one thing that has me worried......

....is the potential for accidental casualties....and there could be a lot, with those kinds of guns in these schools.

[Yavin4]

25. And the budget for books and school lunches will be cut

but, you'll have plenty of fire power. It's great to be an American.

[Auggie]

26. +1,000,000

They'll cut The Arts, too.

[tularetom]

27. What could possibly go wrong?

[longship]

28. I taught high school math in Fontana.

I do not think I have to tell you how very bad a decision this is.

The high school I taught at had over 4,000 kids, and just under 200 teachers. The campus consumed 17 acres. Class size in basic subjects regularly exceeded 40, especially in freshman algebra, a required course for all students, whether they knew how to add two numbers or not. Most could not multiply or divide. Schoolwide, the failure rate in that class was about 75%. My students did barely better than that. Upon repeating the class, the failures skyrocketed.

We rarely needed to do the requisite fire drills. Inevitably, the students would take things in their own hands and pull a fire alarm. Of course, this required an obligatory response from the Fontana fire department who I think would have preferred the scheduled drill.

It was a very tough school. And now they want assault weapons on that campus.

Good luck with that. I am not optimistic about this.

[Auntie Bush]

34. The shooter would know where the weapons are stored and assult the students at the opposite end

of the school. They will just cost money and won't save a single life...just put money in some gun nuts pocket.

[longship]

35. 17 acre campus! Buildings all over the place.

The logistics of responding to any attack would be a nightmare for even hardened and trained veterans, let alone the on-campus resource officers -- yes, they were armed -- who were always very professional and helpful to both staff and students alike.

The administration was more than a bit clueless about how to both handle the enormity of the task of meeting up to the educational responsibilities and simultaneously, keeping things from spiraling out of control. The school board was out of their element entirely. I would speak out at board meetings regularly, always respectfully, but nevertheless with some passion. Some of it did some good, others, not so much. I did help make an important and large policy change concerning when students would repeat a class they were failing. This, over the objections of my department head (who was useless and never listened to her teachers). She later became an assistant principal at another high school where she could inflict her bad policies on a whole school faculty.

So, I am not surprised that Fontana would do this.

[kestrel91316]

29. This isn't going to end well. Students will find a way to get those guns.

[bongbong]

30. Congratulations, Delicate Flowers

Your dream of having America turn into a "2nd Amendment Misinterpretation Police State" is one step closer to fruition.

[Remmah2]

38. The police state is the one where the citizens are not allowed to own the firearms.

The Second Amendment was written with the intent to prevent police states.

The gun grabber agenda only enables the police state.

[bongbong]

39. LOL

> The Second Amendment was written with the intent to prevent police states.

Long, long debunked NRA Talking Point.

Aren't you Delicate Flowers sick of being tools for the NRA?

[alstephenson]

31. Fontucky.

That's what Fontana is "fondly" referred to by many Californians... Sorry, Kentucky!