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DPS seeks $21 million to sustain and expand school resource officer program, requests pay and staffing to bolster highway patrol

Criminal Justice Budget Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee · January 29, 2025
AI-Generated Content: All content on this page was generated by AI to highlight key points from the meeting. For complete details and context, we recommend watching the full video. so we can fix them.

Summary

The Department of Public Safety told the subcommittee it needs $21 million in recurring funds to fully support current state-funded school resource officers and expand coverage, plus investments in pay, vehicles, IT and a new NG911 migration to address staffing and technology shortfalls.

At a Criminal Justice Budget Subcommittee hearing, Department of Public Safety (DPS) Director Dwight Woods outlined a package of recurring and nonrecurring requests to sustain the agency's law-enforcement, highway safety and school-safety programs.

Woods asked the committee for $21,000,000 in recurring funding to continue and expand the state School Resource Officer (SRO) program. "What we're asking for is for $21,000,000 in recurring dollars to continue to fund that program," Woods told the subcommittee, explaining that $3,000,000 of the current need covers a shortfall to fund the existing 430 officers and that…

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