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Oswego police, fire officials talk need for District 308 safety upgrades as part of $317 million referendum · Kendall County News - Shaw Local

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  Oswego police, fire officials talk need for District 308 safety upgrades as
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  part of 317 million referendum. Written by Eric Shelkov.
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  This article is being read by an automated voice, brought to you
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  by Everlet. On average, Oswego School District
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  308 deals with three police service calls a day, according to the
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  district. That is one of the reasons why school district officials say
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  making major security upgrades at all buildings is a priority in its
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  317 million bond proposal on the November 3rd election ballot. District
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  308 has said that 38 million of the funds would be dedicated
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  to making those changes to all of its 22 school buildings. Police
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  and fire officials offered their ideas for improvements when they joined district
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  leaders at Oswego East High School on Tuesday for a community meeting
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  about school safety and security. Planned improvements include installing secure entrances,
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  where doors stay locked and visitor interaction happens away from student spaces.
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  A secure entry vestibule is basically a two-stage approach, where you have
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  a locked outside door, allowing people to come into the secondary vestibule
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  inside of another locked door. Oswego Police Department Sergeant Brian Neering said
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  at Tuesday's meeting. It would allow school staff to properly check people
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  in and out and to properly identify them, he said. That allows
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  for the staff there to control the good people that they want
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  in and to keep the bad people out, Neering said.
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  District 308 has said modern access controls would also be installed where
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  an alert would sound for any door left open or unlocked and
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  doors would lock and unlock on a set time schedule. Other planned
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  improvements include updated camera systems and digital intercoms that would reach every
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  classroom and outdoor space for weather alerts and emergencies, District 308 said
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  District 308 operations Director Andre Scoa said on Tuesday the district's goal
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  is to keep buildings as secure as possible. He noted that keeping
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  outside doors locked is limiting the access of even getting people into
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  the vestibule before They can’t have their conversation with the office staff
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  to find out what their needs are to get into the buildings
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  Officials said that installing digital intercoms would help improve communication in case
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  of an emergency. Digital intercoms convert audio and video signals into digital
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  data. Here at the high school, if we talk about band and
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  choir, what do you think they're doing all day long? They're making
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  music. They're being loud. They can't hear a PA public address system,
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  Skoency said. District 308 chief communications officer Teresa Kamatas
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  said that many of the district's buildings have aging equipment. At the
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  start of They
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  school year, Lakewood Creek Elementary School had portions of their fire detection
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  system failing, she said, and so it was setting off the alarms
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  for no reasons. Oswego
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  Fire Protection District Fire Chief Josh Flanders talked about how new technology
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  can help prevent fires from getting out of control. He said that
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  Groot Industries installed a new material with five levels of fire safety
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  and prevention following a devastating fire at a plain field facility in
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  2021. They put a brand new state of the art system in
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  there, he said. There's robots, there's cameras. As technology changes, it changes
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  your response and how you react to an emergency. Oswego School District
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  308 serves portions of Kendallwill and Kane Counties. For more information on
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  the Update 308 referendum, go to sd308.org slash update three
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  zero eight.