26 school districts stock up on free military gear

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http://seattletimes.com/html/nationworld/2024560093_apxschoolpolicemilitarization.html

School police departments across the country have taken advantage of free military surplus gear, stocking up on mine resistant armored vehicles, grenade launchers and scores of M16 rifles.

26 school districts stock up on free military gear
By TAMI ABDOLLAH
Associated Press
Originally published September 17, 2014 at 12:11 PM | Page modified September 17, 2014 at 12:23 PM

LOS ANGELES —

School police departments across the country have taken advantage of free military surplus gear, stocking up on mine resistant armored vehicles, grenade launchers and scores of M16 rifles.

At least 26 school districts across the country have participated in the Pentagon's surplus program, which is not new but came under scrutiny in recent months after police responded to Ferguson, Missouri, protesters with tear gas, armored trucks and in riot gear. Law enforcement agencies used the program to equip themselves during learner budget years, and since the Columbine school shooting in 1999, schools increasingly participated. Federal records show schools in California, Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Michigan, Nevada, Texas and Utah obtained surplus military gear.

Now, amid increasing criticism, several school districts say they'll give some of the equipment back. Nearly two dozen education and civil liberties groups sent a letter earlier this week to the Pentagon and the Justice and Education departments urging a stop to transfers of military weapons to school police.

The Los Angeles Unified School District -- the nation's second largest school district covering 710 square miles and enrolling more than 900,000 students -- said in a statement this week that it would it would remove three grenade launchers it had acquired under the program in 2001 because they "are not essential life-saving items within the scope, duties and mission" of the district's police force. But the district plans to keep the 60 M16s and a MRAP -- a military vehicle used in Iraq and Afghanistan that is built to withstand mine blasts -- it received.