School District SWAT Teams...¡No Mames!

I know that the natural tendency is to focus on how much of a shit-show EPISD is, but lately Socorro ISD is like, "hold my beer".

And an article in El Paso Matters has highlighted the latest desmadre coming out of SISD - the creation of a SWAT Team. 

Yes, you read that correctly. A SWAT team. They want to call it something else, but its a SWAT team no matter what you call it. 

Like when you get a wrap and its on "flat bread" - we know a tortilla when we see one. 

If you've read the LSB for any amount of time you know I have railed against how our community is over-policed and over militarized. Tax payers pay multiple times for the same services - public safety. Pick your part of the county and you probably pay for public safety once for the county, once for the city you live in, once for UTEP, once for community college, once for the constables, and once for your school district's police force. 

Thats 6 times paying for the same thing.  

Do you pay for the same street 6 times? The same sidewalk? The same pool?

¡Chale!

We just fund government jobs willy-nilly for the sake of "public safety". 

But you can make the argument that we are a safe city because of layered law enforcement. Okay, I buy that. 

Now Socorro ISD is partnering up with some of the smaller entities in the county to create something - at tax payer expense - that is essentially a SWAT team. School district police basically give out tickets to speeders in school zones, catch ditchers, and break up fights at schools in SISD. 

Maya is a life-long SISD student and the SISD PD has always been super militarized. They used to wear desert cammo pattern as their uniform. I don't know why they think they need to dress like they are going to invade Yemen, I always thought that was weird. 

So why the sudden need for a SWAT team in Socorro ISD? Well the Chief of Socorro ISD PD is using the Walmart shooting as justification for the team. As if its not bad enough that "El Paso Strong" is used to sell everything from pizzas to used cars, but now its being used to justify a completely unnecessary expense like the creation of a school district SWAT team. 

And lets be clear - the vast majority of personnel dedicated to the team are going to be from Socorro ISD. The real question is - why the hell did the Trustees approve the expenditure? They really couldn't come up with a better use of funds in the district for oh, I don't know...EDUCATION? Why not improve school infrastructure south of I-10? Why not give teachers a raise? 

Don't even get me started on that golden parachute for the super that just dipped out of SISD....

Seriously - what the hell do we need another SWAT team for? The SWAT team in El Paso didn't prevent the Walmart shooting. Its the most nonsensical justification for an expenditure of that nature that I can think of. 

They were better off saying that the unit was being created to hunt La Chupacabra or La Llorona, than to prevent another Walmart shooting. 

Taxing entities blow a lot of money on some really dumb stuff in El Paso County - but this might be the most irresponsible use of tax payer dollars I've ever heard of - and we once spent thousands of tax payer dollars on a float in the Sun Bowl parade. 

The fine people of Mayberry footing the bill for Barney Fife's motorcycle was a better use of tax payer dollars than giving explosive ordinance to middle school ditcher-catchers.

Sheriff Wiles is right - the creation of this SWAT team is entirely unnecessary.