photo credit: Noah Abrams/KRCB
Students display their homemade signs at the Santa Rosa City Schools Board of Trustees meeting on Wednesday, December 13th.

Santa Rosa’s city hall spilled over capacity Wednesday night with students, school staff and dozens of parents and community members, many donning Montgomery High red, for a nearly six-hour-long school board meeting.

After repeated back and forth between board members themselves, and between board members and the gallery, the board voted to explore two alternative plans to improve school safety.

One put forward by trustee Alegria De La Cruz.

"I move to investigate and to develop an alternative sites program," De la Cruz said.

The other by trustee Jeremy De La Torre.

"I make a motion that we allow the exploration and implementation of an SRO pilot program cooperatively with Santa Rosa City schools, the City of Santa Rosa and Santa Rosa Police Department to address all the voices at the tables, concerns, and needs while we build a sustainable program we can all be proud of and support," De La Torre said.

The two plans reflect the divide over whether or not to return Santa Rosa Police Department school resource officers back onto the city’s school campuses.

Some community members say school resource officers should be part of a comprehensive response.

Including Stephanie Taylor, mother of a Montgomery High student, and one of the founders of the community group Safe Campus Alliance.

"I like to say the overarching theme is additional adults on campus, and that can come through many different types of positions," Taylor said.

The district’s Safety Advisory Round Table convened in the wake of a fatal March 1st classroom stabbing at Montgomery High School. The group outlines measures like more counselors and restorative justice specialists to improve safety and student outcomes.

Kirstyne Lange, President of the Santa Rosa-Sonoma County NAACP, said putting police back on campuses shouldn’t be seen as a “quick fix” for systemic issues within the city’s public schools.

"With so many students still expressing that they don't feel like they belong at school, and that so much of their day is spent in such a punitive nature, how would you find your flow and your groove?" Lange said. "How do you see yourself a part of a campus community when you're not there? But what we do know is that police don't fix that."

Students in the district are calling for more non-police supervision on campus, reformed evacuation and alarm policies including better emergency communication, and a student safety panel.

A survey of close to one third of the student body at Montgomery High School found support for a return of school resource officers.