The Flin Flon school board has improved security alarms and will install additional surveillance cameras in hopes of averting further school break-ins.
At their meeting last week, trustees reported that workers have completed upgrades to the alarms at entrance doors across the school division.
“We think that just because [a break-in] has happened only in one [school] doesn’t mean it won’t happen somewhere else, too,” said Trustee Trish Sattelberger, board chair. “So if we change one and upgrade one, I think we should upgrade them all just because of the fact that they’re all at risk, for sure.”
Trustees have put a renewed emphasis on security following two break-ins in as many months at École McIsaac School.
In addition to upgrading entrance door alarms, the board plans to install more surveillance cameras at the schools.
How many cameras and where? That will depend on available funding.
“It’s as soon as we can get [the cameras] ordered and as soon as we can get it figured out how much it’s going to cost us, that’s when it will happen,” said Sattelberger.
Vulnerability
Even before the October and December break-ins at McIsaac, the school was not particularly vulnerable to intruders, Sattelberger said.
“It wasn’t anything that we didn’t have alarms or we didn’t have doors locked,” she said, adding that the culprits were just “really innovative” in how they gained access.
“We have been upgrading security all along and we thought we had upgraded enough, actually, because we put in even more cameras,” Sattelberger said. “But now that we’ve had issues, we’re looking at even more [effort] into that. We just have to, because we can’t have it happening all the time on us.”
Trustees voted last month to approve $20,000 for improvements to alarm systems. They also referred the issue of school security to the Facilities and Grounds Committee for further discussion.
RCMP have arrested two teenage boys in connection with an early-morning break-in at McIsaac on Dec. 18.
Police said the suspects were trying to steal various electronic devices and surveillance cameras, but those were left behind and seized by officers.
The school also sustained what Mounties called “significant property damage.”
That followed an Oct. 24 incident in which someone broke into McIsaac and dumped paint on the floor and some children’s artwork.
