What role should the police have in schools?
Last year, a new law changed the language around school resource officers, which led to several area police departments pulling their SROs from school districts. If passed, a new bill, HF3489, authored by Rep. Cedrick Frazier (DFL-New Hope), would clarify the role and spell out what duties an SRO has.
Last year’s controversial SRO bill stated that an SRO is an agent of the school and prohibited “any form of physical holding that restricts or impairs a pupil’s ability to breathe; restricts or impairs a pupil’s ability to communicate distress; places pressure or weight on a pupil’s head, throat, neck, chest, lungs, sternum, diaphragm, back, or abdomen; or results in straddling a pupil’s torso.”
The original bill also prohibited “prone restraint,” which means “placing a child in a face-down position.”
However, the bill created confusion among police departments and school districts.
Minnesota Statute 609.06 allows for reasonable use of force and “deadly force,” including chokeholds, “to protect the peace officer or another from death or great bodily harm.”
Did last year’s law override 609.06?
Attorney General Keith Ellison issued an opinion on the new legislation, saying it “does not limit the types of reasonable force that may be used by school staff and agents to prevent bodily harm or death. The test for reasonable force remains unchanged, and is highly fact-specific.”
However, questions persisted. Several police departments pulled their officers from schools, saying the new language might make it difficult to do their jobs.
What’s in this bill?
HF3489 says SROs are not agents of the school. For agents of the school, prone restraint and other physical holdings would remain banned. However, since SROs are not agents of the school, they would not need to follow this rule.
The current wording allows educators to use force – not prone restraint or chokeholds – to prevent imminent bodily injury or death. HF3489 would remove the word “imminent.”
The bill would also take $150,000 for fiscal year 2024 and $490,000 for fiscal year 2025 from the general fund, and give it to the commissioner of the Department of Public Safety “to increase staffing in the department’s school safety center and perform the duties required by this act.”
Finally, there are a few pages describing a model policy of what SROs should do and what training they need. Details would be worked out at a school or district level.
Praise, critique of bill
At a Feb. 12 public hearing at the State Capitol, a few people simply thanked lawmakers for their efforts. Others criticized the bill. Ultimately, The House Education Policy Committee voted 7-5 in favor of the bill, and sent it off to the House Public Safety Finance and Policy Committee.
A common theme among speakers was a concern that SROs have historically and will continue to negatively impact Black and Indigenous students of color.
Youth activist Ali Alowonle mentioned data from the Minnesota Department of Human Rights.
The department reported that, in 2017, “Schools across the state were suspending and expelling Black students eight times more than white students, suspending and expelling Indigenous students 10 times more than white students, and suspending and expelling students with disabilities two times more than students without disabilities.”
Dallas Downey, a member of the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, junior in high school and community activist, also spoke against HF3489.
“Several police officers have said it affects their job by restricting what they can do,” Downey said. “While I’m thankful for the SROs who build relationships and be positive advocates, being able to put a kid in a headlock or chokehold or kneel on their neck (is) nowhere near necessary in our schools.”
Downey asked why the state wanted to let SROs use violent force instead of equipping schools with more therapists, psychologists, counselors and nurses. Per the School Nurse Organization of Minnesota, one-third of schools have nurses. The American School Counselor Association recommends a ratio of one counselor for 250 students. In the 2022 fiscal year, Minnesota had 544 students for every one counselor.
Another student activist, Mira Berndt, spoke against HF3489.
“It’s sickening to think about my countless peers – many of whom are Black, brown, or disabled – who have lasting trauma from being held face down by an adult in an already stressful situation. Even more frightening is the thought that the adults entrusted with the responsibility of our education are willing to accommodate the wants of officers over the needs of students. It is our right to be safe in school, and the implementation of this bill quite literally blocks that right.”
Berndt made the argument that the bill contradicts itself. The duties of an SRO include “relationship building and open communication,” but the student said, “the requirement for open communication is no longer truly there after the striking of language that prohibits SROs from carrying out ‘holding that restricts a pupil’s … ability to communicate’ and prone restraints.”
Attorney Jessica Webster from Mid-Minnesota Legal Aid and Disability Law Center also spoke against HF3489.
“We believe the spirit and intent of last year’s legislation was to ban prone restraint and breath-impacting holds on children in our schools,” Webster said. “Also to ban holds that restrict or impair a child’s ability to communicate distress. Legal Aid absolutely supports that intention and what passed because Legal Aid and the Disability Law Center have experience representing children who have been hurt in prone restraint and prone holds.”
Webster admitted that last year’s legislation did create some confusion.
“We support noting and clarifying that confusion,” Webster said. “Fine, clarify it. But why would we repeal the ban on prone (restraint) and the ban on breath-impacting holds? To be very, very clear, with respect to Representative Frazier, 609.06 does not ban prone restraint on children in schools.”
Frazier has said repeatedly that the language of statute 609.06 protects students from unreasonable force.
“The prohibition on restrictive holds and restricting folks’ ability to breathe with particular holds, chokeholds – that stays in 609,” Frazier said. “That applies to our law enforcement officers. It doesn’t matter if they’re in a school or not in a school. They cannot do that. That would be a violation of the law.”
Bakeberg’s amendment
Rep. Ben Bakeberg (R-Jordan) moved to amend the bill. Bakeber’s amendment would’ve removed the model policy. It also would’ve used $250,000 of the fiscal year 2025 general funds to reimburse law enforcement agencies for costs associated with SRO training, backfilling staffing costs and lodging while an SRO is attending the training.
Frazier spoke against Bakeberg’s amendment.
“The current draft of this bill requires that certain stakeholders are engaged as they draft this model policy,” Frazier said. “If we were to accept this (amendment), we eliminate that process. We’ve heard multiple people testify about wanting their voices heard. What we’re saying if we take this (amendment) is we don’t care about those voices and those voices will not be heard.”
The committee voted against this amendment.
Need for empirical data
Rep. Dean Urdahl (R-Grove City) asked if there was any data on prone restraint or chokeholds.
Commissioner of the Department of Public Safety Bob Jacobson said there will be data collected in the future if HF3489 passes. The Department of Education would record uses of force.
Rep. Peggy Bennett (R-Albert Lea) asked, “Where is the evidence that these changes were needed that were made last year?”
Rep. Heather Keeler (DFL-Moorhead) was disturbed by the lack of data. Keeler reflected on a position she held for 12 years as an Indian education liaison.
“It was my job in that time to be a voice for our kids and our students who are often overlooked and invisible,” Keeler said. “When it comes to the data piece, it’s kind of known that we collect data on the things that matter and it’s really disappointing that as an entire police force, you’re telling me that we don’t have any data on prone restraints.”
Keeler said that when the SRO issue came up in Moorhead, none of the Moorhead teachers or administrators spoke to her about it, but students did.
“Sixty of my students reached out to me and said ‘It is like a prison-style policing in my school,’” Keeler said. “I’ve seen it happen in my district over and over. So I don’t need the data to tell me that this is happening. I believe our students and I believe our teachers and I believe our parents when they come to us and say they’ve seen this happen in our schools. I think this bill has still a lot of work to do.”
Next steps
The House Education Policy Committee voted in favor of the bill and sent it off to the House Public Safety Finance and Policy Committee. The companion bill, led by Sen. Bonnie Westlin (DFL-Plymouth), has been referred to the Senate’s Education Policy Committee.
Representatives Laurie Pryor (DFL-Minnetonka), Josiah Hill (DFL-Stillwater), Kaela Berg (DFL-Burnsville), Sandra Feist (DFL-New Brighton), Liz Lee (DFL-St. Paul), Cheryl Youakim (DFL-Hopkins) and Frazier voted yes.
Representatives Bennet, Bakeberg, Krista Knudsen (R-Lake Shore), Patricia Mueller (R-Austin) and Urdahl voted no.
Keeler abstained.
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