By Mark Price
msprice@charlotteobserver.com

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools has responded to an uptick in school drug activity with a new policy that would allow drug-sniffing police dogs on campuses.

The actual number of drug incidents is small: only 543 students out of last year's 133,774 enrollment.

But it represents a 13 percent increase over the previous year, and school officials say they aren't waiting for further proof of a trend. Instead, they are joining a growing number of U.S. school districts in allowing police dogs to sniff for contraband in lockers, book bags and student cars.

They hope to have a formal policy in place within the next month. The move runs counter to civil libertarians, who say dogs in schools undermine a nurturing learning environment.

Guilford County and Wake County schools both allow police dogs for drug searches, though Guilford is the only one with a formal policy.

CMS allowed police dogs into schools in the 1990s, under former Superintendent Eric Smith. However, the practice was discontinued at some point in the past decade.

Randy Hagler of the CMS Law Enforcement Department says the need for a policy originated with requests from principals and area superintendents who wanted more options for fighting drugs on campus.

"I don't know if the numbers of kids caught with drugs are up because more are using drugs or the staff is paying more attention. Whatever the cause, the increase got our attention," said Hagler, who joined CMS in 2006.

"Do you wait for it to be 600 or 700 until you try to slow it down? We decided not to wait until it's at epidemic proportions."

The new policy allows for specially trained police dogs to sniff lockers, desks, book bags, automobiles and any other personal property at any time. Authorities would search those items. Students linked to the drugs will be subject to criminal prosecution.

District officials say a key point of the policy is that students will not be present in areas where trained dogs are at work. Instead, students will be on "lockdown" in classrooms, unless their classroom is part of the search. In that case, they'll be moved elsewhere, officials said.

Details of the policy are to be published in the CMS Parent-Student Handbook and Student Code of Conduct. But the district says it has no obligation to notify students or obtain consent before the searches.

The policy will be up for a second reading at the Sept. 28 board meeting, when the public can comment. A final reading will be in October, again with time for comments.

Board member Tom Tate is head of the policy committee, and he says the chief reason for having a formal policy is to let the public know where the district stands.

He doesn't expect opposition from other board members "because the policy makes sense." He says it's about making kids safer at school.

"When you don't have a policy, you don't have any procedure to fall back on," he says. "By putting this out there, we are making it clear to the public that this is something we will do. If anybody gets upset, we can show them that we've looked at it, debated it, researched it and made it a permanent policy."

Tate, like Hagler, is not familiar with the use of police dogs on CMS campuses more than a decade ago, or why it was stopped.

There are no statistics on how many schools across the nation use dogs in drug searches, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration. However, policies vary from district to district, including some that allow students and dogs to be in the same area. However, DEA officials say none allow dogs to search students.

CMS officials say searches here will only happen with the approval of the superintendent or chief operating officer, and CMS law enforcement staff will be on hand working with police.

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