DRUG DOGS WILL PROWL OSSEO SCHOOL PARKING LOTS

The district says the searches at its four high schools are meant to
be a deterrent to students using drugs.

Drug-sniffing dogs will be unleashed in Osseo schools' parking lots
this fall.

Initially, the dogs and their police handlers will do random searches
at the district's four high schools. Depending on the results, the
searches could expand to include high school and junior high school
buildings, said assistant superintendent Kate Maguire.

The searches are part of the district's plan to make schools safer,
and not in response to any particular incidents, Magurie said. The
school district is coordinating the searches with police departments
in Brooklyn Park, Brooklyn Center and Maple Grove.

"It's just one of many tools we use to enhance school safety and
security," Maguire said. "Our goal is that kids will know that we're
going to periodically sweep the parking lot. It will be a deterrent. Our
goal is not to catch and trap people; it's to keep drugs out
of the schools."

Dogs have been brought in before to conduct searches, but those have
been in response to bomb scares, Maguire said. The most recent, she
said, was last spring at Cedar Island Elementary School in Maple Grove.

The searches are intended as one of several efforts to make schools
safer, Maguire said; others include installing better lighting and
security cameras, and confining building exits and entrances to one
front entryway.

District officials also consulted surrounding districts that also
conduct random canine searches. Those, Maguire said, include
Anoka-Hennepin, Hopkins and Minnetonka.

Other Twin Cities districts have employed random canine searches in
the past.

Not a secret initiative

Maguire stressed that the district is spreading the news that police
dogs will be sniffing around student cars for drugs. Indeed, district
officials recently issued a release to the news media announcing the
searches.