Council members want trustees to split the costs

Oconee County council members want an officer in every school, but they are not willing to foot the entire bill.  Last night council members called for the school district to pay at least one half of the cost, which could run as high as $766 thousand dollars for the first year.  Councilman Wayne McCall took a swipe at the school administration when he said “there are secretaries to secretaries to secretaries” there. One focus of the meeting was to discuss funding of up to eight additional officers to provide security at the elementary schools. The Oconee trustees previously agreed to fund an additional two school resource officers.  Another option are private security officers but they, according to Sheriff Mike Crenshaw, would cost up to $30 per hour per officer, or more than $277,000 a year for all and still would not provide a level of security that would comfort parents.