The Chicago Board of Education on Thursday voted unanimously to remove uniformed police officers from 39 public schools across the city as soon as next fall. The move comes nearly a month after Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson gave the board clearance to end its $10.3 million contract with the Chicago Police Department, Courthouse News reports. Local activists have long called for cops to be removed from schools, citing research that shows disparate policing of Black students and students with disabilities. Current Chicago It's the fulfillment of a campaign promise of Mayor Brandon Johnson, who took office last fall. “Armed officers have no place in schools in communities already struggling with over-incarceration, criminalization, profiling and mistrust,” Johnson said during his campaign.
There is no consistent evidence that police presence in schools reduces crime, said Aaron Kupchik, a professor of sociology at the University of Delaware who has specialized in school policing for the past 15 years. “It’s really unclear whether they promote or result in more safety,” he said. But opponents of the change say that it should be left to the Local School Councils, which serve as the governing body for each Chicago public school, to determine whether individual schools need police officers. "Blood is going to be on your hands" if something happens in a school with no officers, warned Alderperson Daniel La Spata of the 1st Ward.