Lubbock ISD hiring off-duty peace officers to help meet state security requirements

everythingLubbock.com
by: Jaxie Pidgeon
Posted: Dec 8, 2023 / 08:01 AM CST
Updated: Dec 8, 2023 / 08:19 AM CST

LUBBOCK, Texas – State lawmakers failed to pass Senate Bill 5, an $800 million school safety initiative, before they gaveled out of special session four on Tuesday. The proposal would’ve helped school districts pay for state-mandated security measures under House Bill 3 which passed during the regular session.

“We’re working on it,” said Ray Mendoza, chief of Lubbock ISD Police. “It’s almost impossible. With only 26 officers in my department and 54 campuses, we can’t be everywhere at once.”

HB 3 requires every Texas campus to have an armed officer. The law allotted $10 per student and $15,000 per campus to comply.

“If you combined $15,000 per campus, that’s not going to pay an officer’s salary,” Mendoza said. “It does allow us to hire some officers in an off-duty capacity. We don’t have to equip them and they have their own vehicles already, so that really helps us out tremendously.”

Mendoza has been reaching out to other local agencies and had some luck with officers wanting to help out on their days off. 

“We’re a community and even though we work for different agencies, we work very closely together and that helps us in the end,” Mendoza said.

Since the beginning of the 2023- 2024 school year, Mendoza has hired 35 off-duty officers. One of them is Rick Benavides, a 10-year veteran of the Lubbock Police Department (LPD).

“My days off are Thursdays and Fridays, so I work at the schools on Thursdays and Fridays,” Benavides said.

Benavides works as an LPD patrol officer from Saturday-Wednesday. The remaining two days he spends keeping kids safe at Miller Elementary School.

“I just want to be a presence so people can feel safe,” Benavides said. “The community really enjoys it, the parents really love it, the teachers love it, and the kids love seeing the officer there every day, being able to reach out and touch one and say hi, and to feel like that police officer is a real person who’s there to help them.”

Benavides said it’s a much-needed change of pace from his usual gig.

“I can walk around, check doors, hang out with kids, I go to PE and play dodgeball with them, and then when the kids are outside for recess, I’ll be a presence out there with them as well and we’ll throw the football around,” Benavides said. “The day goes by really fast because you’re just having fun.”

With about 65% of the LISD’s security being off-duty officers, Mendoza said they’ll need to hire 20 more full-time to have a presence on each campus. Although they are short-staffed, he said his current team is stellar.

“The number of calls to our department has gone down significantly because the officers are handling it themselves when they’re on the campus,” Mendoza said. “This has really helped us out. Whenever you can join forces and help the school district survive any kind of potential threats, that’s the key.”