Federal Grant Funds 6 More SROs in Hamilton County Schools

The Hamilton county sheriff’s department SRO program got a big boost Wednesday morning.

A 750-thousand dollar grant from the U.S. Department of Justice will allow the department to hire 6 more school resource officers beginning next year.

Hamilton County Sheriff Jim Hammond and Congressman Chuck Fleischmann made the announcement at a news conference.

The funding comes from the Community Oriented Policing Services Grant program.

SHERIFF JIM HAMMOND, HAMILTON COUNTY  “We think its so important because we’ve got somewhere around 79 schools in the Hamilton county school system. I’d love to have an SRO for every one of them ..that’s hard to do with budgets the way they are. Right now we stand at 24 SROs in the schools.”

Most of the county’s high schools and the middle schools now have an SROs.

The grant money from that Washington program doesn’t go to all districts.

Congressman Chuck Fleischmann is a member of the House Appropriations Committee.

REP. CHUCK FLEISCHMANN, (R) TENNESSEE 3RD DISTRICT    “I was privileged to be able to advocate for this grant. 750-thousand dollar grant, my office was very instrumental in writing and calling and its a very competitive environment. So the funds are appropriated in Washington and then there’s a competitive battle for these funds.”

The school resource officers perform many functions.

LT. SHAUN SHEPHERD, DIR. SRO PROGRAM  “Absolutely its a mentor program. Its a triad approach. First and foremost we are law enforcement. We do get in ther classroom..teach a lot of classes ..some thing that apply to them today ..but also will help them as adults in the future…and we do a lot of counseling with the students as far as personal issues.”

SHERIFF HAMMOND  Personally I’d like the parents out there to know that these officers are not assigned to be simply because we’re assigning personnel, you have to apply to be an SRO, you have to love kids, you have to want to work with kids and help mentor them in the schools.”

Hammond says his office will work with the school superintendent to decide where to place the new officers.

The 750-thousand dollar grant covers a three year period.

The county is required to fund the 6 new positions starting with the 4th year.