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Buffalo Public Schools to hire outside security firm to recommend changes in wake of McKinley HS violence

Four Buffalo School Board members sitting at a table with name placards in front of them.
Mike Desmond
/
WBFO News
Buffalo School Board members at a March 2, 2022 meeting at Waterfront School.

As the criminal investigation of a violent incident at McKinley High School continues, the school system is looking outside for security advice for McKinley and other city schools.

School officials aren't being open about what they found in the wake of a Feb. 9 violent incident that left a student badly injured with knife injuries, a security guard with a gunshot wound and another student apparently grazed by a bullet.

What they discovered may be behind a major rethink of security precautions at McKinley and applying that new look to other city schools. On Wednesday, the Buffalo School School approved bringing in an outside security firm to look and recommend changes, rather than relying on an internal probe.

With only seniors in class and only half of them showing up, Board General Counsel Nathaniel Kuzma said some security changes at McKinley had already started with metal detectors in the building.

"With the rapid-flow metal detectors, I wanted to just inform the board, tonight you have a resolution before you," Kuzma said. "Part of that is the consultation with the security firm will make recommendations to us. We're going to bring them in and have objective sources from the field come in and inform us what equipment, what is best for a school facility like McKinley and others before we procure that equipment."

Kuzma said the school system is holding off on a lot of possible changes until the security firm reports.

"We feel that's the best process to utilize at this point, instead of just buying the first thing," he said. "We want to make sure it's compatible with the building, that it can work efficient and effectively, and we are going to wait on their recommendations before we do that."

Board President Lou Petrucci said an outside investigation is essential to rebuilding trust with the community.

"We're going to ask for an outside consultant to not only, do a study of the district, but to make recommendations as to what's the best way to go forward in terms of security and whatever that may be, because you want to build trust," Petrucci said.

Two 17-year-olds with spotty attendance records at McKinley face felony criminal charges in the incident. They haven't been named, but face trial as adults for the violence on school grounds, less than an hour after the end of the regular school day. The Buffalo Police investigation is apparently continuing to identify the other people involved in the brawl thought to have prompted the violence.

Mike Desmond is one of Western New York’s most experienced reporters, having spent nearly a half-century covering the region for newspapers, television stations and public radio. He has been with WBFO and its predecessor, WNED-AM, since 1988. As a reporter for WBFO, he has covered literally thousands of stories involving education, science, business, the environment and many other issues. Mike has been a long-time theater reviewer for a variety of publications and was formerly a part-time reporter for The New York Times.
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