Call it a case of putting the cop before the cash.
Now that the decision has been made, after months of debate, to place a police officer in Barrington High School, officials are trying to figure out just who is going to pay the estimated $50,000 cost.
The Village Board approved the hiring of a police officer to be placed in the high school, but the trustees made the hiring contingent on the financial support of other villages whose residents attend the school.
The high school`s jurisdiction spans most of the area covered by the Barrington Area Council of Governments, an intergovernmental organization that is made up of Barrington, Barrington Hills, South Barrington, North Barrington, Lake Barrington, Deer Park and Tower Lakes.
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Students from Carpentersville also attend the high school, and that community will be asked to help fund the program, said Barrington Village President Ted Forsberg.
”Less than a majority of Barrington High School students come from the village,” said Ed Glatfelter, Barrington`s village manager. ”We suggested that the funding be done on a population basis because over a period of time . . . kids will go to school from that community.”
But the notion of helping fund a police officer who is on the Barrington police force and who will be in a school based in Barrington may not sit well with other communities.
”To divert village funds for a police officer in the high school wouldn`t sit well with our voters,” said Barrington Hills Village President James Kempe.
”I got a couple bad roads, and more than just our residents use them. But I don`t think another village would want to help pay for them. Each town has its own responsibilities, and it has to carry them out as a rule.”
But Forsberg said there is a precedent of such apportioned funding among the villages in the area council.
The DARE drug prevention program, which is run in the Barrington middle schools and presented to classes by Barrington police officers, is paid for by each neighboring village in proportion to the number of students receiving the program, Forsberg said.
But because the number of Barrington middle school students from Carpentersville is so small, the village is ”not concerned” that
Carpentersville does not contribute to that particular program, Forsberg said. The idea has been met with considerable opposition from parents and students, some of whom sold ”Stop the Cop” T-shirts. The deaths of two students, one involved in a fight and the other in a drunken-driving accident, coincided with the proposal of the program, causing some school officials to say that it was not evaluated objectively.
After controversial school board meetings, debates and reports, the Unit District 220 board decided last month to place an officer in the school by the start of the 1992-93 school year.
The Barrington Area Council of Governments will discuss the funding proposal Tuesday.
Barrington Police Chief Jeffrey Marquette introduced the program, which he says he believes will help build a rapport between police and students at an age where they may have trouble relating to police.
”We don`t want to come across as the enemy,” Marquette said. ”We want to be known as accessible. We want to improve relations.”
Marquette said the major responsibilities of the officer will be to counsel students, be an instructor and provide security at sporting events.
The officer would be someone currently on staff. Another officer would have to be hired to fill that officer`s position.