SB 1093, An Act Implementing the Recommendations of the Juvenile Justice Policy and Oversight Committee

The ACLU-CT believes that in order to reduce the harm that policing is causing communities of color across the state, Connecticut must reduce the role, responsibilities, and presence of systems of policing. This means, at minimum, diverting funds from policing to building safe and healthy communities. School resource officers are police, just as much as any other law enforcement staff across the state, and their in-school policing has much of the same effects on school communities as municipal and state policing have on the broader community. Police presence in schools is a key link in the school-to-prison pipeline. We must reinvest the money that this state has dedicated to in-school policing in programs that are actually designed to help kids thrive, like alternatives to suspension or expulsion, decreasing class sizes, and providing sufficient mental health resources.