In light of the mass shooting at a Connecticut elementary school last month and the increasing public concern over school safety, the Hamilton City School District is reviewing its procedures and the security of each building, including the possible addition of panic buttons and other communications measures.

“Chad Konkle will head up a committee to look at our practices and resources in this area to confirm we’re on the right track or see if there are areas we could use more proficiency,” Superintendent Janet Baker told the board of education Tuesday.

Konkle, who is the administrator in charge of buildings and grounds, said that the district revised its Emergency Procedure Plan in the spring of 2012 based on the advice of local fire and police officials.

“It was a comprehensive plan,” he said. “We looked at everything we do in terms of security, reviewing our procedures for lockdowns, what to do in the case of missing children and other crisis situations. We brought in experts to help us come up with a protocol on how to react to these situations.”

The Hamilton Police Department helped the district come up with a set of procedures to make sure that all parties were working from the same plan, said Public Information Officer Kristy Collins.

“We had plans in place, but it’s always a good idea to go back every so often and make sure we’re responding in the best possible way,” Konkle said.

For the new committee, he will again seek the help of local safety professionals and will involve the community and staff members, including all building principals.

“I expect that we will meet twice a month for the rest of the school year,” Konkle said. “Part of the process will be to have community conversations down the road so we can get input from everyone.

“We want to keep the group manageable in order to get this done,” he said. “We’ll re-examine our current practices in general and then go school-by-school to see what’s working and what needs to be improved. We’ll also take a look at what other districts are doing and have the police come in and train us on the latest procedures.

“We school safety very seriously,” Konkle said. “We make a conscious effort every day to make sure we don’t have any tragedies in our district.”

The current plan includes provisions for lockdowns, evacuations, medical emergencies, hazard spills and bomb threats, he explained.

“Schools are required to have one lockdown drill, three tornado drills and ten fire drills each year,” he said. “This is all monitored by my office to make sure everyone is well-trained in this area, and every employee has a flip chart of ‘dos and don’ts’ to follow in emergency situations.”

The district has 14 paraprofessionals who have been trained to monitor for security and police officers are placed at the high school, freshman school and Garfield Middle School. Each of the elementary schools have a buzzer and intercom system at the main entrance, and cameras help cover “blind spots.”

While the paraprofessionals currently don’t have formal training in crisis response, that will be among the topics the new committee will address, Konkle said.

“Paraprofessionals are typically present at our safety meetings,” Collins said. “We go over new safety tips that they can use and get some help.”

The Hamilton Police Department currently has access to all of the security cameras in each of the buildings, he said.

“If there is a door left open, all of our staff members have been trained to shut the door and report it to the administration,” Konkle said.

Because all of the elementary schools are new, they were designed to have the latest security technology, and the secondary schools have been renovated to have better front-door security.

“Principals currently have the ability to lock certain doors from their office, and we’re having telephones installed that will give the principal to communicate with the whole school, giving them more options to communicate during an emergency.”

The telephone lines into the office will be an extension of what currently exists in the outer offices of each building. They would allow the principal to be in his or her office and be able to speak to the entire building or specific areas or wings via public address speakers.

“That’s a feature that principals are really adamant about having,” Konkle said. “That would give us an additional communication option during a crisis.

“We hope to have that done by the end of the school year and are currently in the process of getting estimates on the cost,” he said.

The district is also installing a “panic button” at the front desk of each building that doesn’t have one that will be linked to the 911 system, he said.

“At the elementary level, we already have the panic buttons,” he said. “We’re currently looking at what the cost would be to equip the secondary buildings with one, but we expect that to be a minimal cost.”

The changes and the pending review “should help reassure the community that we take safety seriously and that we’ll continue to find new ways of increasing security in our schools,” Baker said.

Current district policy strictly prohibits any kind of weapon on school grounds or in school buildings except for police officers, said Board of Education President Glenn Stitsinger. It is clearly posted at the front of each building and that policy will probably not change.

“We haven’t discussed the issue” of allowing teachers, principals or other staff members to be allowed to carry a gun into the building he said. “That’s something that would require a lot of debate and a lot of thought.

“When you have trained police officers, they can make decisions in the heat of a crisis situation,” Stitsinger said. “People who have firearms training won’t have the same kind of experience and you don’t know how they’re going to react in a crisis.

“I personally don’t think it’s a good idea” to arm staff, he said. “It’s something we could consider, but my guess is that it would not ever be on the table.”