Feliz and Tisch discuss school safety agent and crossing guard headcount
Feliz asks for current budgeted headcount for school safety agents and crossing guards. Tisch reports SSAs cut by 264 positions to 3,651, and crossing guards at 2,290 employed against 2,309 budgeted. Tisch expresses disappointment about the SSA cut but notes positions were vacant.
All right, moving on to school safety agents and school crossing guards.
Can you give us the new budgeted headcount for school safety agents and crossing guards?
Yes, I can.
Okay, school safety agents were cut by 264 positions to 3,651.
Does someone have school crossing guards in front of them?
If not, I can get it here.
Hold on, I have it.
Do you have it?
School, I don't see it here.
So we just recently hired a 94 in May.
So that leaves us with 31 vacancies.
The allocated budget is $2,309.
Christine, do you have the specific numbers for school safety agents?
Sorry, sorry, for school crossing guards.
So I have 2,309 for the allocation.
We just hired a class of 94 in May, so that leaves us with 31 vacancies.
Okay.
Thank you, Chief.
Yeah.
All right.
Can you tell us how the current...
Head count compares to the head count for the last five years for school safety agents and school crossing guards?
Down, but we will get you those specific numbers.
Do you?
I don't have it by year here.
I just have this year.
And I know we're reducing the school safety agents by 264.
Do you think what we have right now is enough?
No.
And if not, why the cut?
I was disappointed about that cut, although I understood it because those were vacant positions.
My hope had been to hire up to our previous authorized headcount, and we were looking at a number of different ways.
To gin interest in taking that test and to have basically more people interested in becoming school safety agents.
And the reason we weren't up to headcount is because we didn't have enough, quote, qualified candidates.
So we were looking at a number of factors, including looking at some of the physical requirements to become school safety agents, which seemed to be, to my mind, out of line with what the job
requires.
So I was hoping to make progress increasing the number of school safety agents before this cut occurred, but I do understand that it occurred because those positions were vacant at the time.