Each month, Perry County schools and agencies involved in emergency management, juvenile justice, and health meet at Perry County School District 32 (PCSD 32) to discuss school safety and health matters.
Schools include District 32, St. Vincent de Paul Catholic Schools, Immanuel Lutheran School, Altenburg Public School, and United in Christ Lutheran School. Agencies invited include the City of Perryville, Perryville Police and Fire Departments, Perry County Sheriff’s Department, Perry County Juvenile Office, Perry County Emergency Management, and Perry County Health Department.
The September meeting agenda included discussions on the recent school threats and the role of social media in those incidents, creating more efficient processes for sharing information between schools and agencies, emergency water storage on campus, and the drug identification class held Sept. 23 on campus.
The threats resulted in a lockdown of PCSD 32 schools on Sept. 16. Two days later, Superintendent Dr. Fara Jones released a statement announcing that two juveniles had been referred to the juvenile court for charges in connection with social media posts regarding threats to commit shootings at district schools on the 16th.
The investigation reportedly involved the school district, school resource officers (SROs), Perryville Police Department, and Perry County Sheriff’s Department.
According to Dr. Jones, both juveniles were placed in the custody of the appropriate authorities. She explained that law enforcement officials had determined neither situation constituted a “credible” threat. In neither case did the juveniles appear to plan or indicate an intention to commit a school shooting.
During the Sept. 23 meeting, Jeremy Mantz, director of Perryville Emergency Management, presented information on the city’s new outdoor warning siren activation system.
“This fully automated system monitors the National Weather Service (NWS) for any tornado warnings issued for the City of Perryville and adjacent areas, about five miles from the city’s center,” he said. “Whenever the NWS issues a tornado warning polygon in this area, the system automatically activates our outdoor warning sirens. We have lots of redundancy built in as well; we can activate the system from our radios if emergency personnel in the field see a tornado, and I can start the sirens directly from my phone.”
According to Mantz, the tornado siren tests conducted at 10 a.m. on the first Monday of each month will now take a minute and are designed to operate the sirens off the battery backup. Also, he can see when any siren is offline from the control center,
Garrett Schott, safety director and SRO at District 32, said that the Schools Safety Meeting allows county schools and agencies to share resources.
“We all work together to keep our students and staff safe and healthy,” he said. “We create a safer community for everyone by planning ahead for various emergencies, debriefing on incidents that have occurred, and sharing educational and informational opportunities. We have created a community within the larger community that is really focused on our schools.”
