Back to School: Safety is a top priority at Miami-Dade schools

MIAMI – The Miami-Dade Schools Police Department is getting ready for students and teachers to head back into the classroom next week.

CBS4’s Nicole Lauren sat down with Police Chief Edwin Lopez to discuss safety measures officers are taking.

Lopez said that safety is always paramount each school year and he understands the worry parents have as they send their children to school.

“God forbid we have an incident. We know time is of the essence. We have seen what happened in Parkland. We have seen what happened in Uvalde. It’s troubling and I want parents to know that we are doing everything we can in Miami-Dade County to ensure that our schools are safe,” he said.

Lopez gave Lauren a tour of their command center where officers and staff monitor cameras, track school buses, and answer emergency calls.

“We remotely monitor over 18 thousand cameras at school sites. We GPS track every single school bus in Miami-Dade County. We have a system called ShotSpotter which is a military-grade ballistic technology system,” said Lopez.

The ShotSpotter can detect when gunfire is near a Dade school campus. The tech can even show law enforcement how many times shots were fired.

On top of this technology, Lopez said that training is absolutely critical to mitigating a threat on campus. He said conducting drills, like an active shooter situation, is a multi-agency partnership and it’s necessary for these agencies to be on the same page.

Lopez also spoke about the current safety measures in place regarding doors and gates locking.

“In Miami-Dade County, we have a policy that requires teachers to lock their doors, teachers, faculty, and administrators to lock gates of schools. We have an officer at every school,” he said.

Lopez also discussed school threats emphasizing the “see something, say something” mentality.

“We’re not there to arrest kids, that’s not our primary mission. Our primary mission is to prevent incidents and build relationships to mitigate incidents. But, unfortunately, there are signs that are being overlooked by people who live in their own house,” he said.

Lopez explained that they do risk assessments of school campuses to decide where to conduct their large-scale active shooter drills. They have drills monthly.