Minutes
School Health and Safety Subcommittee Meeting
Monday, December 5, 2011
A meeting of the School Health and Safety Subcommittee was held on Monday, December 5,
2011 at 4:15 pm in the Superintendent’s Conference Room. Present were Ms. Barbara Isola,
Mrs. Anne Mahoney, and Mr. Dave McCarthy, Chair. Also attending were Superintendent
DeCristofaro, Mrs. Colleen Roberts, Mr. Mike Draicchio, and Ms. Laura Owens, Clerk.
The meeting was called to order at 4:13 pm by Mr. McCarthy.
Mr. Draicchio opened the meeting with a review of the Security issue priorities gathered from
the recent School Improvement Plan presentations. Some have already been addressed by
Maintenance and many others already have work orders in place. Mr. Draicchio works with Mr.
Murphy on prioritization and adding new items to the list as they surface. The new security
cameras purchased through the recently-awarded Security grant from the Norfolk County
District Attorney’s office ($3000) are ready to be installed at five schools. Mr. Draicchio would
like to see a minimum of eight cameras at each school, newer cameras are color and have night
vision capabilities. Mr. McCarthy inquired about lighting on the Hunt Street side of North
Quincy High School and this has been upgraded, along with the lighting in the front of the
building.
Mr. Draicchio then reviewed the process for generating the Physical Security Checklists,
compiled bi-monthly with each school’s principal and custodial staff.
In terms of traffic concerns, all crosswalks were repainted by the Department of Public Works
prior to the start of school. We are fortunate to have traffic supervisors provided by the Quincy
Police Department, plus two from the DCR. School Resource Officers, DARE officers, and
Community Police Officers also are involved with managing traffic. Seven elementary schools
and one middle school, plus the ECC have ongoing traffic concerns. For Security staffing at the
High schools, each school has four officers.
For Safety and Security partnerships, Quincy Public Schools is fortunate to have a great
relationship with not only the Quincy Police Department, but also the Norfolk County District
Attorney’s Office, the Norfolk County Sherriff’s Office, the MBTA Transit Police, the Quincy Fire
Department, Quincy Probation, the Department of Children and Family, and the Department of
Youth Services. Representatives from each of these agencies participate in the monthly
Security Roundtable meetings. The team is focused on reviewing and revising emergency
procedures this school year.
Professional Development for Security staff has focused on recognizing gang signs and symbols,
anti-bullying, self-defense; all staff is certified in AED/CPR. Upcoming trainings will include ID
screening, report writing, emergency phone calls, and school searches.
There was some discussion about the process for signing in both the High School security
offices and Elementary and Middle Schools main offices. Visitors are supposed to sign in and
out of the building, but often don’t return their visitor passes. It has been suggested in the past
that we retain visitors’ driver’s licenses, but there are concerns about implementing such a
policy. Mr. Draicchio described ID scanners that do instant background checks and will research
the costs.
Other items on the Security wishlist include DVR cards for security cameras, additional cameras
for inside and outside schools, computers for the Quincy High School security office so staff can
use Starbase and email. (North Quincy High School security officer already has computers.)
Subcommittee members were very complimentary of Mr. Draicchio’s efforts over the last
couple of years to streamline procedures and make improvements to the overall security of the
schools. Mrs. Isola noted that given the size of the system, we have a low amount of incidents.
The High School security staffs, in particular, really know the kids in a good way.
The next meeting of the Health and Safety subcommittee will be in the Spring of 2012.
The meeting was adjourned at 5:21 pm.