TONTOGANY – Otsego Local Schools will not change its policy and allow staff to carry firearms on campus.

At the June board of education meeting, member Mark Tolles said the district should utilize available tools, including arming teachers, to keep students safe from terrorists.

Ohio House Bill 99 allows school personnel who pass a basic firearms training program to carry firearms on school property, upon the board of education’s approval.

The district’s current policy states that no one, except the school resource officer, is allowed to carry firearms on school property.

Tolles said the policy should be changed.

Board President Brad Anderson asked to see the district’s policy before the next school board meeting, which was held July 27.

He said he had talked to school administrators and teachers.

“I don’t know if we have any union support on this if we change our policy,” Anderson said. “My personal opinion on this is the fewer guns in the schools, the better.”

Tolles said in June that deputies with the Wood County Sheriff’s Office are at least 10 minutes away if they are at the department in Bowling Green.

Anderson said he talked to a sheriff’s captain about how long it would take a deputy to arrive in the event of an emergency.

“He couldn’t give me a good answer, or he didn’t want to give me an answer,” he said. “I am not in favor of changing our policy. It is a frightening thing to consider.”

He thanked Tolles for broaching the subject so it would be considered.

Tolles offered no comments at last week’s board meeting.

Anderson said he does not want to put the responsibility of taking out a possible shooting threat into the hands of a teacher, administrator or staff.

“To ask them to take on that responsibility, even if they would volunteer for it, it opens up some liability issues I don’t think anyone has thought about,” he said. “There are 9 billion things that could go wrong as we’ve all seen. They go wrong quickly, and they go wrong tragically.”

Board member James Harter added he was not in favor of changing the current policy.

He did recommend the board look at its protocols and update them if necessary.

“There’s a lot of confusion circulating around the Uvalde police response,” Acting Superintendent Kevin O’Shea said.

The Otsego staff train every year with local law enforcement personnel, he said.

Sheriff’s deputies have fobs to get into the buildings if there is a lockdown, and they will enter immediately to remove any threat, O’Shea said.

“It’s very clear what their responsibility is, and they will be coming into this building,” he said.

O’Shea said that leads to one of his fears — that a teacher or staff member will step into the hallway holding a gun and be shot.

“They’re coming into this building and they’re looking for the threat,” O’Shea said of law enforcement.

He said Dep. Brian Ruckstuhl, who is the district’s school resource officer, has a pulse of what is happening on campus.

Board member Gordon Digby said the district needs to learn from other incidents.

“It’s very unfortunate when these things happen,” he said.