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Leon County schools report drop in weapons on campuses as partners expand prevention programs
Summary
District and law-enforcement officials told the school board workshop the district has recorded fewer weapons seizures and lower rates of simple batteries and fights over three years, and outlined diversion, mentoring and tip-line programs aimed at sustaining those trends.
Chief Jimmy Williams told the Leon County School Board at a Nov. 17 workshop that the district has seen a steady decrease in weapons and violent incidents over the past three school years. “The district had 65 total weapons” in 2022–23, he said, dropping to 41 in 2023–24 and 27 in 2024–25 — “so that’s a 58% decrease in three years.”
The presentation, billed as a district safety collaboration update, brought school staff together with Tallahassee Police Department (TPD), the Leon County Sheriff’s Office and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) to explain how prevention and response are being coordinated. TPD’s community-relations sergeant, Steven Stabletas, described education and engagement programs — Officer Friendly, RAD Kids, active-shooter and suicide-prevention presentations, a youth cadet program and a “Lock It or Lose It” campaign to reduce gun theft — and said the goal is to give students alternatives to violence.
Kevin Timbs, introduced by school staff as a school-resource unit representative, described diversion practices: school referrals are routed to community partners, and where appropriate students are connected to programs and the state attorney’s office. “Back on Track is essentially, if you have a student that gets in trouble criminally, we’ll refer them to that program,” he said, and added that “that program has been placed on hold due to funding.”
John Beeman, a special agent with FDLE’s domestic security unit, described the role of multi-agency behavioral threat assessment teams and analytics that help vet Fortify Florida tips and distinguish spoofed calls from credible threats. “We can help the school board with the threats act as a force multiplier,” Beeman said, noting FDLE analysts also provide statewide information to contextualize local tips.
District staff and partners also described mentoring and targeted youth programming: summer camps for referred youth (113 attendees across two camps), a mentoring network that includes Big Brothers Big Sisters, Bigs and Blue, A 100 Black Men of Tallahassee and Omega Lamplighters, and a pilot where sheriff’s office sworn and civilian staff serve as mentors. Staff said they used $200 gift cards in one outreach effort to increase family participation and that they are pursuing grants to repeat camps in spring and summer.
Officials highlighted anonymous reporting as a major information source. Chief Williams said the district’s 24-hour tip center received more than 9,000 tips last school year and is on track to increase that volume this year, crediting outreach and multiple anonymous-reporting platforms for earlier interventions.
Why it matters: Board members said they want the public to see the multi-agency work behind the trend lines and to understand that prevention (mentoring, counseling, targeted camps, threat assessments and a visible uniformed presence at bus stops) is layered with enforcement. The district repeatedly framed the decline as the result of a communitywide effort rather than a single technical fix.
Next steps: Staff offered to provide the board with the underlying data and follow-up reports; members asked for more information about referrals, program outcomes and how interventions are tracked over time.
