Saugus school officials stress security

SAUGUS – School safety was a priority of every department during budget presentations to the School Committee and superintendent Tuesday.With the incident of the Danvers High School teacher slain by a student in the school?s bathroom only months ago, both Belmonte Middle School Interim Principal Kerry Robbins and Saugus High School Principal Michael Hashem both asked for more video cameras in their schools to beef up security.Hashem asked for $120,000 for security at the high school, including cameras, locks, increased visual surveillance and monitoring, and fixing the front vestibule in the main office. “It?s a reality we live in,” said Hashem. “My first goal is to foster culture, but none of it can happen without safety. None of it is going to get done if everyone is looking over their shoulder.”Technology Specialist Bakir Becirovic said the high school was “one of the further-behind” as far as security, because a lot of the elementary schools had security cameras that were funded by the Parent Teacher Associations. Both Becirovic and Hashem said they would jointly look into some kind of portable cameras that could be transferred to a new high school if one is built in the next few years.School Committee member Arthur Grabowski said he was concerned over Robbins? request for cameras at Belmonte. “We just went through an $18 million renovation with 23 cameras, and right now we?re not even six months into the school year and we need more security done?” asked Grabowski.?I don?t want to advertise where the cameras aren?t, but I can let you know,” Robbins told Grabowski. “If I told you where they weren?t, you?d know there was a need.”Superintendent Michael Tempesta said he planned to work closely with the police and fire departments to increase security district-wide, though he wouldn?t say how. “Not only is this more timely because of recent events, but we were looking at it anyway,” he said.