About 13–14 Robeson schools do not have a full-time SRO daily; district cites funding and municipal staffing limits
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Summary
District officials said all high schools have full-time school resource officers, but roughly 13 to 14 other schools lack a full-time officer every day. The district said funding and the ability of local law-enforcement agencies to assign officers affect coverage; the committee discussed potential costs and limited grant flexibility.
District officials told the finance committee that while all high schools in Robeson County have multiple full-time school resource officers (SROs), roughly 13 to 14 schools do not have a full-time officer present every school day and instead share officers or have part-day coverage.
"So it's roughly gonna be at least 13 to 14 schools that do not have a full time person in the building every single day," Bobby, a district official responsible for resource-officer coordination, said.
Cost and funding: The district said it spends about $2.2 million for SROs overall and that municipal partners (County of Robeson, City of Lumberton, Town of Red Springs, Town of St. Pauls and Town of Pembroke) supply officers in many cases while the district reimburses salary and benefits. Bobby said costs vary by municipality and provided an example range from roughly $160,000 to $162,000 per officer per year for one local contract.
Officials noted limited flexibility of some grants: a former practice allowed SROs to be funded from safe-schools money, but staff said rules and priorities have changed. "Historically, you could pay for resource officers out of safe school money. That changed," a staff presenter said. They added that the district’s safe-schools allocation (about $181,000 referenced in discussion) would only cover a short period of officer costs and is a competitive grant that requires reapplication.
Operational options and constraints: Board members asked how the district could increase full-time coverage. Bobby said increasing coverage would require additional local funding and that law-enforcement agencies would need to provide officers; when the district previously increased SRO numbers it took three to six months for a law-enforcement partner to fill vacancies. The committee discussed that some schools share officers by proximity and that an increase in local appropriations would be necessary to place an SRO in every building full time.
Discussion vs. decision: The committee discussed coverage, costs and grant limits but recorded no formal vote on SRO staffing at the meeting.
