"Last year, the General Assembly appropriated $35 million for school safety grants. At the time, some legislators were unhappy with the intended use of the money." “Our kids have not asked for more armed guards in our schools,” tweeted Rep. Leslie Herod, D-Denver." Read full article #shootings #LeslieHerod #schoolshootings #gunviolence #schoolsafety

"The rising prison inmate population in Colorado — and the cost to house them — is a long-simmering issue at the Capitol that is getting a new look." "This year, state lawmakers even approved reopening part of a long-shuttered state prison in Cañon City despite adamant opposition to the idea just a year earlier. To get a better handle on the trend and the options to address it, lawmakers approved the Prison Population Management committee." “If the trend doesn’t reverse, we a

Students of color, critics say, are being arrested for misbehavior once handled by school administrators and counselors, thanks largely to an increased police presence in schools. Colorado state Rep. Leslie Herod points to a 2016 report by Padres y Jovenos Unidos that said in Colorado, after a decade of steady reductions, the statewide school suspension rate grew by 19 percent during the 2014-15 school year. During that same period, there were 3.5 times more suspensions of bl

Policy makers would do better by Colorado students by spending state resources, scarce as they are, on supporting investments in positive school climates, with programming designed to nurture student development. We should also invest in resources that improve and ease a student’s access to mental health professionals. These are proposals I can support. I cannot support placing more police in our schools and I call on my colleagues to similarly reject this wrongheaded approac