3 schools work together to boost security

To improve overall security procedures while making the best use of their financial resources, three of the area’s Jewish day schools — the Hebrew Academy of Long Beach, the Hebrew Academy of the Five Towns and Rockaway and Yeshiva of South Shore — will partner to hire a director of security.

“We are trying to work together to secure all the schools,” said Reuben Maron, executive director of HAFTR, which has 1,200 students, from preschool to 12th grade, in two locations in Cedarhurst and Lawrence. “This could be cost-effective and improve our ability to do lockdowns.” During a lockdown, no one is permitted to leave or enter a school building.

HALB Executive Director Richard Hagler said that a director of security would oversee existing security personnel, ensure that policies and procedures are adhered to and look for ways to upgrade school safety.

“Our goal is to keep the students, faculty and staff safe and maintain control over situations as they arise,” said Hagler, who oversees nearly 1,700 students and approximately 300 employees at four different schools and one day camp under the HALB umbrella: the Lev Chana Early Childhood Center and the Stella K. Abraham High School for Girls, which share a building in Hewlett; the Davis Renov Stahler High School for Boys in Woodmere, the HALB Elementary School in Long Beach, and the Avnet Country Day School camp.

“We are pooling our resources to get more bang for our buck,” said Rabbi Dovid Kramer, executive director of Yeshiva of South Shore. Kramer’s school has 560 students in kindergarten through 8th grade, and a staff of 62.

Hagler and Kramer agreed that the hiring of a security director was not prompted by the shootings in Newtown, Connecticut, last December or the bomb threat called in by a student at Mesivta Ateres Yaakov High School in Lawrence on April 16.

The administrators said that many schools are reviewing, and trying to improve, their security.

“We are just trying to upgrade our security the best way we know how,” Hagler said. “The safety of our children is first and foremost.” The budget for the position has yet to be set, he added.

Paul Goldenberg, national director of the Secure Community Network, said that there have been “several dozen” incidents at yeshivas in the metropolitan area in the last five years, including bomb threats and acts of vandalism. “We see the numbers rise when violence increases in the Mideast and it targets Israel,” Goldenberg said.

The SCN is the national non-profit homeland security initiative of the Jewish Federations of North America and the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations.

When necessary, the schools are in close communication with Nassau County police stationed at the 4th Precinct in Hewlett and Auxiliary Police Unit 109, which comprises about 30 trained volunteers that patrol the Five Towns. Capt. Danny Gluck, the commander of Unit 109, said he thinks that hiring a director of security is a positive step.

In addition to conducting day and night patrols of Five Towns communities, he explained, the auxiliary unit has assisted at Lawrence school events such as the Homecoming parade. “If there’s something requested by the schools, which they do from time to time, we’re always there, whatever it might be,” Gluck said. “We’re there for them, as we are for everybody.”

Maron said that the overall goal is simply to keep everyone safe. “We want to have the proper number of security people,” he said, “and make sure that the schools are properly secure.”

This article first appeared in the Nassau Herald on Wednesday.