DATE: Thursday, October 23, 1997            TAG: 9710230506

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B5   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY DENISE WATSON, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: NORFOLK                           LENGTH:   39 lines

NORFOLK SCHOOL BOARD EXPECTED TO VOTE ON THE USE OF HANDCUFFS

The brawl last week at a Portsmouth high school has convinced at least one School Board member of the need for handcuffs in city schools.

``It confirmed my belief that handcuffs can be used and should be used,'' board member Ulysses Turner said. ``I am convinced that our security force needs some sort of weapons.''

But another board member, Alveta Green, still plans to vote against authorizing handcuffs, saying that using the restraints seems too hostile and unnecessary.

The School Board is expected to vote today on allowing security guards to use handcuffs when violent students, intruders or staffers become a threat to themselves or others. The decision will come after two months of debate on whether using handcuffs, which is seen as too aggressive by some in the community, outweighs the quick resolution security officers say handcuffs would bring.

Under the proposal, security officers would use handcuffs after verbal mediation and physical control holds have failed. The coordinator of security would investigate the use of handcuffs to ensure that proper procedures were followed.

The board has delayed a vote on the issue twice because of concerns that the use of handcuffs might be antagonistic and that security officers, despite training, are neither as qualified nor as compensated as police officers.

Norfolk is the only South Hampton Roads school system that doesn't have personnel with handcuffs in schools. Virginia Beach, Portsmouth, Suffolk and Chesapeake have police officers assigned to high schools and some middle schools armed with handcuffs and guns. ILLUSTRATION: DETAILS

The informal session of the School Board meeting will begin about

10:30 a.m. in the School Administration Building, 800 E. City Hall

Ave. The formal session will begin at noon. KEYWORDS: NORFOLK SCHOOL BOARD NORFOLK SCHOOLS

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