BY MIRIAM SMITH
The Cincinnati Enquirer
MASON -- A fight was supposed to break out after school, but one phone call kept it from becoming more than a schoolyard rumor.
Last spring, a principal with the Mason City Schools received word of the scuffle and put a stop to it.
The district last winter was the first in Warren County to hook up to a free hot line giving parents, teachers and students the chance to anonymously report safety concerns. Kings and Little Miami school districts followed.
Buoyed by those districts' successes, other Warren County school systems now are in line, part of a statewide and national trend to stave off school violence with a service offering anonymous phone access to authorities.
"This is an opportunity to provide a communications tool 24 hours a day," Little Miami Superintendent Michael Virelli said Thursday.
A series of school shootings last year spurred educators to step up safety measures.
Nationally, 11 children and two teachers died in five school shootings last school year -- all with guns fired by other children -- in Pearl, Miss.; Jonesboro, Ark.; West Paducah, Ky.; Edinboro, Pa.; and Springfield, Ore.
Representatives from Warren County's eight school districts Thursday met with county commissioners about the service -- called Safe School Helpline -- operated by Security Voice Inc. of Columbus. Commissioners are committed to funding the service for all districts -- public and private, as part of a two-year pilot program -- said Commissioner Larry Crisenbery.
That translates into about $16,000, or 15 cents per student in grades 7-12. The helpline, however, is available for students and parents of all ages, officials said.
The commissioners are expected to vote on the issue Tuesday. It will then be about a month before the service is operating in the districts that sign up.
Callers are kept anonymous, and the information is transcribed and sent to the schools by fax. Callers are assigned a code number and are asked to call back in three days while the matter is investigated. If the issue sounds serious, such as a student threatening to bring in a weapon, the school would be immediately notified and police would become involved.
Cincinnati Public Schools has its own in-house "safe line," an anonymous line to report security concerns around the schools, said Janet Walsh, senior communications specialist with the district's public affairs department.
"(But) if it's an emergency, it's 911," she said. "We don't want to confuse people."
Butler County, Mount Healthy, Loveland, Northwest Local and Princeton school districts also have signed up for the School Safe Helpline, officials said.
Milford and Oak Hills school districts are looking into the service, officials said.
The service was a success in the Mason schools last year, said Shelly Benesh, district spokeswoman. Most of the handful of calls received last year concerned reports of vandalism, she said.
"Principals were able to follow up on those situations, which is nice because they wouldn't have been able to know about them otherwise," Ms. Benesh said. "I think if you prevent one incident, it's a success." Jim Jones, vice president of Security Voice Inc., said about 95 Ohio districts and several in Kentucky and Indiana have contracts with the service.
The anonymity of the service appeals to the public, Mr. Jones said.
"I suppose the five tragedies that took place last year have gotten people's attention. If you do some research, in every case, there was someone in that school who know beforehand that something was going on, but they were afraid to tell someone or didn't know who to tell," he said.
