Placer County Office of Education continues to make safety a priority

Responses to the Placer Grand Jury Report were published last week and one thing is clear – both the Grand Jury and Placer County Office of Education value the importance of a safe school environment. The Grand Jury's findings, in their 2019 report, showed most county schools visited did not have adequate visitor badge information but that schools are diligent in creating a culture of safety and security for students, staff and the community with the available resources. The county office pointed out that of the 10 school sites the Grand Jury visited, none were county-operated. "(The office of education) develops comprehensive school safety plans for the seven program sites in which we directly oversee and operate," said Michelle Eklund, chief communications officer for the County Office of Education. "Each plan is tailored to consider the various needs and challenges of our student population and facilities." The County Office of Education is under the leadership of Placer County Superintendent of Schools Gayle Garbolino-Mojica and the County Board of Education. The Office of Education serves as a link between the California Department of Education and 16 local school districts in Placer County. In regard to public safety at all 16 school districts, the office of education hosts quarterly county-wide District School Safety Committee meetings with 100 percent participation. These meetings include law enforcement and first responders. In response to not having adequate visitor badge information, the county office of education's response partially disagreed. "While there may not be a standardized format across Placer County school districts regarding the information on a visitor badge, most schools employ a visitor badge system or process that they are able to administer efficiently," the response stated. The response also stated that how the visitor badge process is operated is decided by each individual school district. The Grand Jury report recommended the county office of education require visitor badges, which they stated they do in the report, and that they require all visitor badges be retrieved at the end of the visit. Garbolino-Mojica stated in the report that while they support the badge retrieval at the end of a visit, they cannot fully implement that recommendation because of the open nature of many school campuses throughout Placer County. She said in rare instances visitors may leave without signing out. "While this situation is infrequent," she said, "(County Office of Education) leadership will further investigate means of curtailing occurrences of unaccounted visitors."