By Leslie Collins
Northeast News
March 7, 2012

“It’s an issue that impacts the entire city,” Kansas City Police Department Capt. Todd Paulson said of truancy. “When kids aren’t going to school, they’re not getting an education, and when they’re not in school, they’re doing something somewhere where they shouldn’t be, so crime increases.”

Indian Mound Neighborhood Association President Katie Greer has witnessed truancy first-hand.

“When I was laid off, the first week I was home during the day I was shocked at how many kids I saw running around. I don’t think people realize how big of a problem it is.”

While walking her dog during school hours, Greer found a student firing a BB gun at a vacant house. Another resident reported finding a youth tagging her garage in her backyard.

Kansas City Public Schools (KCPS) is pushing for the passage of a city-wide truancy ordinance, which sets a daytime curfew for youth ages seven to 16. The curfew would commence 30 minutes after the school day starts and would end 30 minutes prior to the time school adjourns. Students found loitering or hanging out in public places unsupervised would be in violation of the daytime curfew. There are exceptions, like homeschooling, traveling to school functions, among others. However, if an officer located a student legitimately skipping school, parents/guardians would be contacted and the student would be returned to the parents or guardian or returned to school. If an officer is unable to locate the parent or guardian, the student would be transported to a designated secure location until the parent or guardian arrived. Subsequent offenses would be subject to a $100 fine.

Paulson said KCPD supports the proposed truancy ordinance.

“These kids should be in school getting an education, not running around,” he said.

When students skip school, the neighborhoods surrounding the schools become a target, he said.

Common crimes include graffiti, property damage, burglaries, stealing and loitering, he said.

“For the most part, it’s a non-violent crime, but it has a big effect on the people that live there,” Paulson said.

City Council member Scott Wagner, who supports the proposed ordinance, said those types of crimes become a gateway to more serious offenses. While some opponents argue Kansas City should focus more on lowering its murder rate instead of truancy, Wagner disagrees.

“The reality is truancy is a gateway to more heinous issues,” he told Northeast News. “Murders don’t just happen in a vacuum, for the most part, especially those that are gang related or drug related in the city. They all start somewhere. They’re all a progression.

“It’s the old adage of an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. This is an example of that.”

Asked to describe the truancy problem at KCPS, KCPS Executive Director of Student Intervention Programs Dr. Louis Cordoba said to look at the attendance rate.

“We’re not meeting the DESE (Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education) standards for attendance,” Cordoba said.

To comply with DESE standards, at least 95 percent of enrolled students must attend school on a regular basis. In 2012, KCPS’ elementary schools averaged a 94.1 percent attendance rate and the high schools averaged 88.5 percent, he said.

Reasons for truancy vary, he said. It ranges from student apathy to lack of parental involvement to boring teachers. Some truants are bright students who don’t feel challenged enough at school, Cordoba said. Sometimes students are influenced by their friends to skip school, he said.

Regardless, parents are the key, he said.

“It goes back to the upbringing of kids, setting values and morals,” he said. “What I’m seeing with some of these kids is they don’t have that in place at home. The home is unsupervised; the home is in chaos, meaning you have drugs, alcohol, domestic violence, parents struggling with two jobs.”

There’s a number of socioeconomic issues, and a number of parents aren’t spending enough quality time with their children or teaching them sound morals, he said.

“It’s not that the kids have changed, it’s us as parents, in my opinion,” Cordoba said.

Truancy isn’t just a KCPS issue. It’s also affecting the Hickman Mills C-1 School District.

In response to the proposed truancy ordinance, John Baccala, director of media relations for Hickman Mills, wrote to Wagner, voicing the district’s support.

“In our district, truancy is the number one disciplinary issue at the high school level. In fact, nearly 90 percent of our disciplinary issues at Ruskin High School are truancy-related,” Baccala wrote. “Chad Ryerson, principal at Ruskin High School, said he is ‘all in favor’ of your proposal because he spends more time dealing with truancy than any other issue and a proposal like yours would allow him to concentrate more of his school’s resources on education, where it belongs.”

To further address truancy, KCPS is also working with community partners to provide mental health services to students and provide social services. It’s also creating parenting resources through its newly launched Parent University. Another goal for KCPS is to create a truancy court and it’s currently in negotiations with the Jackson County Family Court. Cordoba said the Family Court is onboard. Truancy court would be a “strength-based intervention” that would include counseling, social workers and referring families to resources within the community, he said.

Passing a truancy ordinance is just the first step in addressing truancy, Cordoba said.

In Richmond, Calif., a similar ordinance has already shown success, Paulson said.

“They enacted it in 2010 and they saw a 39 percent decrease in crime around the school,” he said.

During the Feb. 29 Public Safety and Emergency Services Committee meeting, the proposed truancy ordinance was presented and the committee voted to hold the ordinance in committee for two weeks. Committee members requested more data on similar ordinances in other cities. Committee members also voiced concern over punishing guardians and parents with too many fines and questioned how the school district or city would fund a designated space for truants.

“We know it’s not a fix all,” Paulson said of the proposed ordinance. “But we the police department feel it would have a big impact on reducing truancy, it would help out the school districts, and in turn, it would reduce crime and make the neighborhoods better. It’s a win-win.”