Committee to tackle security issues

MARBLEHEAD – A 16-member committee will seek ways to tighten up security in the Marblehead schools.School Committee members appointed all but one of the members before starting their retreat Tuesday morning.Included in the committee so far are Superintendent of Schools Paul Dulac, School Committee member Jonathan Lederman, Glover-Eveleth Schools Principal Mary Devlin, Lead Nurse Paula Dobrow, Facilities Director David Dunkley, Police Lt. Matthew Freeman, Fire Capt. Jason Gilliland and parents Bob Bragdon, publisher of CSO Magazine for security executives, State Trooper Byron Rizos, Harvard University Police Officer Thomas Karns, Johnson Controls account executive Michael Michaud and former educator Kristin Percy.Serving as non-voting members will be School Committee Chairman Amy Drinker, Police Chief Robert Picariello and Firefighter Charles Cerrutti.School Committee members originally advertised two parent vacancies on the committee, but ended up appointing all five parent applicants to the committee based on the skills they represented.The committee has one more vacancy, a kindergarten-Grade 6 teacher, which the School Committee hopes to appoint at their first meeting in September.Although the committee had its genesis in an incident at Marblehead High last spring, it will oversee security measures and changes at all schools system-wide, Drinker said.The Virginia Tech shootings and the discovery of a bullet at Marblehead High last spring made the committee a top priority. More than a month ago, when the idea came up at a School Committee meeting, Drinker said the security panel would make sure that the schools are doing “what we’re supposed to be doing and what we can do.”Meanwhile Marblehead High Principal John Ziergiebel listed building safety as an important priority in his School Improvement Plan for next year.Ziergiebel, Assistant Principal Kathleen Duff and the high school crisis team have been reviewing safety procedures with staff and students and coordinating their plans with the police and fire departments.The school plan will use radio communication, increase door security and camera surveillance and use electronic telephone messaging to communicate with parents.