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'I made a mistake' | St. Louis County Council member on controversial resolution opposing School Resource Officer program

Non-binding document opposing School Resource Officer program caused uproar among some school districts, parents and police leaders

ST. LOUIS — The St. Louis County Council appears poised to do an about-face Tuesday night on a resolution it passed at its last board meeting, which read, in part, “the Council does not recommend nor advocate for the presence of officers in school settings.”

5 On Your Side reported Friday that the resolution sent some parents, school districts and other council members into an uproar, believing the resolution was a referendum on the School Resource Officer program. 

Democratic Council members Rochelle Walton-Gray and Kelli Dunaway sponsored the resolution, which passed in a 4 to 3 vote as their fellow Democrats aligned with them and the Republican minority opposed it.

Dunaway told 5 On Your Side Monday she saw the resolution’s final language for the first time 30 minutes before the meeting and approved it in haste.

“I think it’s important when we make mistakes as public officials, we work to fix them and that’s what I’m trying to do. I made a mistake.”

Gray said she drafted the resolution when she served as a Representative for the state of Missouri after Mike Brown was killed in 2014 because her concern was training.

Dunaway added the controversial language to the resolution, she said.

“Clearly as we’ve seen these past few years and months, de-escalation is not a priority in training, or, if it is, it’s not being taught properly,” Gray said. “My concern is police officers be trained on those things when they’re in the schools and communities.”

RELATED: Resolution opposing officers in schools causes uproar among schools, parents and council members in St. Louis County

Gray said the St. Louis County police department offers training on a module basis even pre-pandemic in which officers are not in-person with instructors and only answer test questions about issues such as cultural sensitivity and other topics.

“That’s not adequate in my opinion,” she said.

St. Louis County Sgt. Benjamin Granda noted Gray's criticism of the department's de-escalation training was "an interesting pivot" in the conversation seeing as though the word de-escalation was not in the resolution in question.

He said the virtual classes are only a supplement to the in-person training, and said all SROs attend the National Association of School Resource Officers training, advanced training, and additional training related to their assignment as an SRO.

"If any of our elected officials would like to visit the St. Louis County Municipal Police Academy for a better understanding or to experience some training first hand, we would be happy to oblige," Granda wrote.

Gray and Dunaway say they plan to support a counter-resolution written by Republic Councilman Tim Fitch during Tuesday’s meeting.

“I made a mistake and I feel really bad about it,” Dunaway said. “A lot of constituents have given me compelling reasons why they support the program and when I took the time to learn more about it, and talked to members of the (St. Louis County Police Association), they really helped educate me on how the program works.”

Fitch said his resolution will support the SRO program and recognize about a dozen officers who have been recently recognized for acts of bravery in their respective school districts throughout the county.

“I think they realized they screwed up,” Fitch said of the Democratic council members. “But I give credit to people for admitting they were wrong.”

Dunnaway said she believes there should still be scrutiny of the program, as there are studies she believes that show how officers in schools contribute to the school-to-prison pipeline, “as well as how they may actually be diverting from it,” she said.

The resolution is a non-binding document, meaning it does not mandate any type of changes occur.

“We’ve had a lot of resolutions coming down at the very last minute without a lot of time to process or think through the consequences,” Dunaway said. “We’re rushing decisions we need to spend more time grappling with.

“I learned a really big lesson on taking more time before signing my name to something. It was really foolish.”

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