ST PAUL, Minn. — After several law enforcement agencies suspended their school resource officer (SRO) programs in response to a new state law about restraint policies, DFL leaders said Tuesday that they're open to adjusting the language when the legislature returns to the capitol in February.
Senator Steve Cwodzinski (DFL-Eden Prairie), the chair of the Education Policy Committee, said the Minnesota Department of Education proposed the new rules around restraints within school buildings. Ultimately, DFL leaders passed the law as a part of a broader, 341-page education spending bill. The clause in question bans SROs from placing students face-down in the prone position, restricting their breathing, or putting pressure on the upper body, unless there's a threat of death or injury.
"The reason I was supportive of this law is, A) George Floyd. We don't want that to happen in our schools," Cwodzinski said in an interview with KARE 11 on Tuesday. "The law got passed. The law was signed by Gov. Walz. It passed out of policy in the Senate and the House, and then all the sudden about two weeks ago, [my] phone starts ringing off the hook."
Despite assurances from Attorney General Keith Ellison that police could still use certain restraints to prevent death or injury, some law enforcement groups have said the law remains too vague and opens their officers to liability on the job. The Anoka County Sheriff's Office, Coon Rapids Police, the Hennepin County Sheriff's Office, and the Clay County Sheriff's Office are among those who have pulled some SROs out of buildings ahead of the school year.
"We're all trying to juggle right now, to figure out how we should proceed," Cwodzinski said. "Everybody that has talked to me, they have my word. We're going to have a hearing on this and we'll invite all the stakeholders — the chief of police, the SROs, the school administrators, counselors, everybody, because we want to hear and we want to get it right."
During an interview with WCCO Radio on Tuesday, Gov. Walz said he was also open to clarifying the law.
"The Attorney General, we're trying to get some folks [to] get clarification," Walz said in the interview. "If we need to, we just come back and change it and make sure, because those officers, we need to make sure that they and the students are safe. But we also need to make sure that we're not using excessive force to break up a fight. And I think that was the intent of the law."
However, Walz said he does not plan to call a special session about the SRO issue, meaning lawmakers will have to wait until the start of the next legislative session in February 2024 to discuss the topic.
That comes as a disappointment to Republican Senator Zach Duckworth, who said there is "no question" a special session is necessary to fix the law.
"My suggestion would be simple. Let's just repeal the portion of the law that folks find controversial or ambiguous or doesn't have clarity," Duckworth said in an interview with KARE 11 on Tuesday. "Let's just hit reset and go back to where we were."
In February, Duckworth raised concerns publicly about the proposed SRO rules during an Education Policy Committee meeting.
At the time, he told his fellow lawmakers that the language "puts some limitations on what they're able to do to keep folks safe" and suggested the legislature solicit more feedback from school districts and law enforcement agencies.
"I'm not here to point fingers really. I'm interested in getting this corrected so that our kids and teachers have a safe learning environment," Duckworth said Tuesday. "We're seeing SROs being pulled out of buildings — that's an emergency. We've got to stop that."
Senator Bruce Anderson (R-Buffalo) also released a statement on Tuesday after the Hennepin County Sheriff's Office pulled an SRO out of nearby Rockford High School, saying the DFL "rushed policy through the committee process and turned a blind eye to the impact of their partisan agenda."
"We are once again seeing the results of Democrats' bad process as school resource officers are removed from our schools. We rely on SROs to help keep teachers and students safe, the removal of these officers will make our schools less safe," Anderson said. "This will continue to happen until our law enforcement officers receive the clarity they need, and with the new school year set to begin, it's critical to get this issue resolved as soon as possible."
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