School safety task force issues recommendations for Oregon

PORTLAND – A task force formed to improve school safety says Oregon should establish a tip line, develop a database of school floor plans and fund a statewide threat assessment system to identify and help students who present a potential risk for violence.

The recommendations were included in a report released Wednesday by the Oregon Task Force on School Safety. It was established by the Legislature last year following shootings at the Clackamas Town Center and the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut.

The group’s goal was to come up with strategies to respond more effectively to school violence and active-shooter situations. Its report addresses safety at grade school through high school levels.

Since the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre, at least another dozen school shootings have taken place throughout the country, including at Rosemary Anderson High in Portland, at Reynolds High in Troutdale and at Umpqua Community College, where last month a gunman killed nine and before turning the gun on himself.

“With the recent shooting on the UCC campus in Roseburg and other incidents across our state and nation, it is clear we need to do everything we can to help make our schools safer,” said Clackamas County Sheriff Craig Roberts, who chaired the Oregon task force.

Use of tip lines or hotlines, various threat assessment systems, and even sharing of floor plans with law enforcement is now happening in at least a dozen states across the U.S., said Ronald D. Stephens, executive director of the National School Safety Center.

Oregon used to have a school safety tip line, created after the 1998 shooting at Thurston High School in Springfield, but it was discontinued due to budget cuts. The report strongly recommends its reinstatement.