The Dickson City Council and Dickson County School Board approved a new agreement that will continue the presence of nine trained School Resource Officers in all the public schools located within the City of Dickson.
The memorandum of understanding for the 2023-2024 school year was approved by the City Council on July 17 and the School Board on July 27. When the new school year began Tuesday, Aug. 1, the Dickson Police Department provided two SROs at the Dickson County High School main campus, one SRO each at the DCHS 9th grade lower campus, Dickson Middle School, Centennial Elementary School, Dickson Elementary School, Oakmont Elementary School and The Discovery School and a supervisor/detective for a total of nine SROs.
“The City of Dickson remains committed to providing every resource available to ensure a safe and nurturing environment for the children who attend public schools in the city,” said Dickson Mayor Don L. Weiss Jr. “We are pleased to continue our relationship with the Dickson County School System.”
The Dickson Police Department used a grant to initiate an SRO program in 1998 at Dickson Elementary School. Ten years later the city funded a full-time SRO at Dickson County High School. In 2011, the city and school board approved an agreement to add an SRO at Dickson Middle School with the school system reimbursing the city for 185 days of salary and benefits for the officer.
Following the Feb. 14, 2018, school shooting in Parkland, Fla., Mayor Weiss proposed and the City Council approved funding two more SROs: a second at DCHS and one floating among the four elementary schools and intermediate school.
In July 2018, the school board added funding for SROs in all of the county’s schools and in October 2018 and January 2019 the Dickson Police Department added four more officers to place two SROs at DCHS and one at each of the six other public schools in the city.
In 2020, the City Council approved a request from Police Chief Jeff Lewis to fund an SRO supervisor/detective, bringing the city’s commitment to nine school resource officers.
Following the March 27, 2023, shooting at The Covenant School in Nashville, Gov. Bill Lee proposed and the Tennessee General Assembly approved a $230 million school safety program that includes funds to place one SRO in every public school in the state.
The Dickson Police Department applied for and received a grant to fund six SROs. Because the grant funding is only for one officer at each school, under the MOU approved in July the school board agreed to continue reimbursing the city for two SROs, a second at the DCHS main campus and one at the 9th grade lower campus, which is considered part of the same school. The city will continue to fully fund the supervisor/detective.
“The Dickson Police Department has been devoting resources to school safety with an SRO program for 25 years and has had officers in every public school in the city for over four years,” said Chief Lewis. “We will continue to do everything possible to build positive relationships between law enforcement and students that we believe will lead to a stronger and safer community.”
The school resource officer program is part of the Dickson Police Department’s Special Services Division under Lt. Jessica Blackwell, who went from the department’s Law Enforcement Explorer Post as a 15-year-old to become the city’s second full-time SRO when she was assigned to DCHS in 2011 and rose to become supervisor over the program before her promotion in 2021.
For the 2023-2024 school year, the Dickson Police Department’s SRO assignments are:
• Dickson County High School main campus Holden Foster
• Dickson County High School main campus Craig Haneline
• Dickson County High School lower campus Cameron Stinson
• Dickson Middle School Daniel Lewis
• Centennial Elementary School Tabitha Jennette
• Oakmont Elementary School Jamie Patterson
• Dickson Elementary School Larson Petty
• The Discovery School Val Duran
• Supervisor/Detective Curtis Robertson
The City of Dickson’s budget commitment to nine SRO positions totals over $650,000 with a little more than $100,000 reimbursed by the school system and $450,000 from the state school safety grant to cover salaries, benefits and equipment.
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