Back in January the Hillsborough County School board rejected Superintendent MaryEllen Elia's bid to upgrade every school in the district with an armed officer, citing the hefty financial costs.
But how much longer can they resist the pressure to beef up security?
While it seems impossible to pass any laws affecting guns in this country (with the issue not even on the table in Florida), the focus here is about arming up the schools.
Yesterday a security expert paid more than $8,000 to consult with the district advocated hiring about 140 security officers – at a cost of some $4 million. Are they willing to cough up that money? Can they afford it? Can they not afford it? What gets cut in the budget to afford it? And is it the right thing to do?
School board members have a big decision to make.
We were out and about yesterday, first checking out Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn's annual State of the City address. The enthusiasm chief in charge rose to the occasion, though we're still a bit befuddled by the film aired inside the Kress building to begin the proceedings…
Then we zipped down to St. Petersburg for another discussion about the Lens Pier project. Tiger Bay officials seemed paranoid that things were going to get crazy, but all in all, it was a relatively genteel discussion.
And attention bicycling aficionados: a bike safety summit will be taking place in Tampa in two weeks, with Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood joining the festivities.
This article appears in Mar 21-27, 2013.