Drug sniffing dogs will soon be allowed on Redondo Union High School’s campus to sniff lockers and around common areas for contraband items, the School Board decided at Tuesday’s meeting in a 3-2 decision.
“I believe this will be a strong deterrent on campus if students see the dogs,” said Nicole Wesley, RUHS principal. “I don’t see this as a ‘gotcha’… We understand students do and may take drugs but we are going to do everything in our power to keep that from happening on campus. I believe that with these dogs, students will think twice if not three times about bringing contraband on campus.”
A Drug and Alcohol Community Task Force including police officers, community members, school employees, parents and counseling professionals was created three years ago to address the issues surrounding substance abuse. The group was tasked with creating a plan to reduce drug and alcohol use in the community.
Frank DeSena, assistant superintendent, headed the task force. He said that the inspections may not end student drug use entirely but should help prevent some students from being exposed drug culture.
“No one thing is the answer,” DeSena said. “It’s just another area where the students can say we are taking some action to try to reduce substance use and abuse among our youth.”
Originally, four out of five school board members were against the use of the dogs. Board members Laura Emdee and Anita Avrick overcame initial reluctance and joined board president Jane Diehl in support of the drug searches.
“I didn’t think it was right to do it to the kids,” said Laura Emdee. “But, we have a district committee and we gave them the task to look this over and if we aren’t going to take their recommendation, then what’s the point of having the committee? …My response to them was that this cannot be their only point of action or only solution – they had to come up with an entire plan towards this issue, that this dog inspection can’t be all that they depend on.”
According to student school board member Brooke O’Neal, students were divided about the use of the dogs. She said that limiting the searches to lockers – and not backpacks and cars, as was earlier proposed – made the proposal somewhat more palatable.
“When it’s about sniffing everything, they are against it,” O’Neal said. “They think it’s an invasion of privacy. Then when you say just lockers, it was really split about people being against it and people saying ‘I’m okay with it.’ We did a survey and found that 124 were okay, 94 against and 61 thought it wouldn’t solve anything. They thought that if they’re just going to do lockers, then people will put it in their backpacks.”
Board member Anita Avrick said parents were enthusiastic about the program. “For me it was overwhelming – the parents that said that this is a really good idea,” she said. “Most of them thought that kids are uncomfortable with what’s going on on campus, and they know what’s going on… The kids that are going to take the drugs, they are going to have it on them. They are going to have it in backpacks, in cars, at home – they are going to have it everywhere. It’s not going to make a difference, but at least it gives them the idea that we really truly don’t want it on school property.” She also stressed the importance of counseling support for those students who are found with drugs.
Todd Loewenstein and Drew Gamet voted against the proposal.
“I think it has some serious constitutional issues, personally,” said Loewenstein. “I know it’s considered public property, but I do think that there is a degree of concern that I have that we are risking sending a very bad message to kids that we don’t trust them… I also think they are going to just push it off campus. Kids will find ways around this. Let’s not delude ourselves.”
The school board and the Redondo Beach Police Department will meet in the future to discuss the next step of the program and to decide the frequency with which the dogs will be brought onto campus, and the consequences for students discovered with drugs.
