By Cathy Spaulding
Muskogee Phoenix, Okla.
MUSKOGEE, Okla. — An officer shortage could prompt Muskogee Police to discontinue school resource officers at Hilldale Public Schools after this school year, Police Chief Johnnie Teehee said.
But Hilldale School Superintendent Erik Puckett said he plans to advocate keeping the two school resource officers, continuing a 10-year commitment from the city. Puckett said the school pays 75% of school resource officer financing with the city paying the remaining 25%.
Muskogee City Council could discuss the matter at its April 28 regular meeting.
Teehee said the police department is nine positions short. Muskogee Public Schools has its police department.
“When you figure those that are in training, those that are in CLEET, injuries, we’re almost 25% short on our patrol,” Teehee said. “We rotate some of our non-uniform guys into patrol on a two-week basis, two at a time. We’re so short-handed, we worry about their abilities mentally and physically. They don’t have ability to take days off.”
Teehee said MPD will keep officers at Hilldale through the end of the 2025 school year, but cannot hire and train police officers in time for the start of the 2026 school year.
Teehee said his staff is working on different options for keeping an officer at Hilldale. He said one option could be to have an officer at the school during student drop-off and pick-up, as well as during lunch periods.
“Those are high visibility times, those are when the most people are at the school,” Teehee said. “We would have officers there during those times.”
Puckett said he didn’t want to talk about other options until the council decides.
“You can provide security, but our SRO program is not security only,” he said. “It’s about community policing. It’s about relationships, it’s about building that bond between police and our community and our city. I just think it’s such a special program, and part of that is how great our police department and what they’ve done to provide people who are quality trained.”
Teehee said the biggest benefit of the program “has been having the officer there on campus.”
Muskogee County Sheriff Andy Simmons said the county provides deputies at Braggs and Oktaha .
Simmons said having a county school resource officer at Hilldale is possible, “but we would have to find additional personnel.”
Fort Gibson , Haskell and Warner Public Schools work with their police departments for school resource officers.
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