DEL.ICIO.USEquipment theft a costly problem for schools
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Monday, October 27, 2008
After hours, schools can become shopping malls for thieves. Laptop computers, color printers, flat-screen TVs — even shiny musical instruments — wait in quiet classrooms, easy marks for the taking.
Inventory thefts cost metro Atlanta school districts hundreds of thousands of dollars each year, with students losing resources and taxpayers footing the bill.
Vino Wong/vwong@ajc.com
Gwinnett County resource officer Jack Woody patrols the campus of Peachtree Ridge High School Wednesday. After school hours, campuses can become shopping malls for thieves.
Teachers in a bind sometimes have to share equipment until stolen items can be replaced. Missing extras, such as video cameras, CD players and microwaves can become things cash-strapped schools must learn to do without.
“When something is stolen from a school, we take it very seriously, as it boils down to lost instructional time and materials for our students and teachers, as well as lost taxpayer dollars,” said Steve Flynt, chief academic officer for Gwinnett County Public Schools.
Gwinnett’s public schools conducts annual inventories of school property. Since 2005, nearly $400,000 has been spent to replace missing or stolen equipment. Although that’s only about 0.2 percent of the district’s more than $200 million inventory, the sting suffered by theft still weighs heavily on schools, especially during budget crunches.
“When a school district has to replace stolen property, the cost displaces funds that would be used for other educational purposes,” said Doug Goodwin, a spokesman for Cobb County’s public school system, which reported more than $250,000 in losses last school year, up from $135,000 the year before.
Cobb’s schools, like Gwinnett’s system, self-insure against thefts by budgeting money to cover the cost of missing equipment. Standard classroom gear teachers need for instruction is replaced first, but not necessary immediately. Only about 80 percent of items reported stolen gets replaced, said Goodwin. “We have to make do when there is a loss.”
DeKalb County’s school system insures its equipment under a policy with a $100,000 deductible per incident. So, when about $10,000 worth of equipment was reported lost or stolen two years ago and nearly $79,000 worth vanished last year, the system had to get “creative” to replace it, said Dale Davis, school spokesperson.
“The equipment that we do have is not enough,” Davis said. “When someone violates our schools and takes equipment, they are directly impacting our students. The computers, the laptops, are tools that students use to obtain the knowledge they need to be successful.”
Thefts mostly occur on weekends or during winter and summer breaks, when schools typically are empty. Thieves are drawn to schools because of the high-end electronics that outfit some classrooms, including computers, digital cameras and projectors that not only show movies but also flash assignments written on a teacher’s laptop.
“Schools have always been a target for thieves because of the lack of inventory controls,” said Frank Rotondo, executive director of the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police. “Something goes missing and before you know it, it could have been missing a month before it’s noticed.”
Poorly lighted trailers can also attract thieves, allowing them quick access to valuables without the risk of having to break into a main building, which is more likely to be protected by alarms and cameras, Rotondo said.
Cobb County’s school board recently agreed to spend more than $200,000 for motion-detection and security systems for portable classrooms. Special surveillance cameras were added in areas targeted by vandals and thieves.
DeKalb County Schools also invests in security equipment and extra patrols.
Gwinnett Schools has cameras monitoring trailers and alarms in main buildings, but thefts and break-ins still occur.
In August, a Jones Middle School teacher’s laptop was stolen from her trailer. A Meadowcreek High band teacher reported a projector was missing.
At Grayson Elementary School, burglars crept into the front office, rummaged through drawers and made off with a set of school keys to interior and exterior rooms, according to a police report.
Police said that, although the school’s security cameras didn’t capture images of the burglars, the intruders left unusual calling cards: Two Santa hats with eye holes cut in them were lying on the floor near a conference room.
In June, Gwinnett’s school police scored a major bust. The department helped thwart a burglary ring targeting trailer classrooms.
Police arrested 21-year-old Robert Franz Joseph II of Dacula and charged him with stealing projectors worth about $1,000 apiece from trailers at six schools. Joseph, now in jail, faces eight felony counts of burglary and eight counts of theft by receiving.
His lawyer, Jeffrey Sliz of Lawrenceville, said at least eight others are involved.
School inventory thefts are likely to continue as long as their police departments are under-funded and under-staffed, Rotondo said.
“It all comes down to how much money you are willing to invest. It’s not the first priority of the education system to provide security. The education of students is the priority,” he said.
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