Gates Chili board pauses reorganization for public hearing on updated school safety plan

Steve Torres, the district's safety and security supervisor, told the Gates Chili Board of Education during the reorganizational meeting that the districtwide school safety plan "is in complete compliance with the New York State Education Department's minimum standards." He presented three specific updates to the plan and opened the plan for public hearing.

The most notable changes Torres described were to emergency-response language and training. He said the plan's Section 2.2 now lists multi-hazard training and that the emergency-response terms were revised to "shelter in place, hold in place, evacuate, secure lockout," replacing previous phrasing that distinguished lockout and lockdown.

Torres also reported a revision to Section 3.4 to reflect new titles and positions on the superintendent's cabinet for the 2025-26 school year and an update to Section 5.7 to document the district's emergency remote-instruction plan, which the district began developing for the 2023-24 school year and has posted information about on the district website.

Board President Catherine Coffey moved to pause the reorganizational meeting so the board could conduct the public hearing on the school safety plan; the motion was seconded by Dr. Christine Richards and approved unanimously. The public hearing produced no public comments, and the board closed the hearing and resumed its public meeting by unanimous vote.

Discussion-only vs. formal action: the presentation and the hearing were informational and for public comment; the transcript records no adoption or amendment vote on the plan at this meeting. The formal board action recorded was to pause and then to resume the reorganizational meeting so the hearing could occur.

The board did not receive public comment during the hearing. The district did not announce any immediate effective date or next required action for the plan during the presentation.