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Local fallout from Littleton Photo by Jim Craven Campus monitor Lynnette Johnson talks with McLoughlin Middle School students during lunch break Thursday. In the wake of last week's killings in Colorado, calls for more security and better planning in schools are on the rise. Valley schools get the jitters Calls about violence, threats go off the charts By VICKI GUARINO A scattering of bomb threats, death threats and a panic raised by a man carrying an unloaded BB gun show communities from Ashland to Butte Falls on edge in the days after the nation's worst episode of school violence. Across Jackson County, school staff and law enforcement have been scrambling to keep their feet amid the aftershocks of the high school shootings and double suicide in Littleton, Colo. As the last of Columbine High School's dead are laid to rest, local educators and juvenile authorities say they are fielding an unprecedented number of calls. At Butte Falls High School, classes were called off briefly Wednesday after the words "bomb threat" were discovered on a school wall. A 16-year-old student was arrested. Police found no bomb. In Eagle Point, a 12-year-old on the bus to school Monday asked classmates for a gun to shoot at least two students she didn't like. She was arrested. No gun was involved. In Medford, Internet chat room talk buzzed of threats to students. Rumors raged by Thursday that specific Medford students might have been named on the Web site as targets. As an investigation ensued, the chat room proved to be elusive. "You can't have any idea of the number of people looking for it," North Medford High School Principal Don Lacey said Thursday, in the midst of an unproductive Web search. No one has come forward with a hard copy of the Net talk threat. The first-hand reports Lacey has been able to retrieve -- from students who said they saw the site -- were narrowed only to a "Southern Oregon" school. No students were named. Meanwhile, Lacey has been getting 10-15 telephone calls a day about school violence and preparedness at the 1,900-student high school -- the largest in Jackson County. "Parents want to know, `What are you doing? Is it safe?"' Usually, no one calls Lacey with those question. But these are unusual days. Ashland police are still shaking their heads over the man carrying the BB gun in the neighborhood of two schools last Friday -- just three days after Columbine. Ashland Middle School officials locked kids into classrooms while police apprehended the suspect -- a man officers say they now know posses no threat to the community. Ashland police Capt. Mike DeCapua said no one is sure what the man's rationale was that day, but that the Columbine shootings seemed to have been a factor. For years, Jackson County schools have called on police when discipline matters have grown serious. Police, unarmed police department community service officers and school security staffers have routinely roamed school grounds. School administrators met regularly to work out procedures for handling violence. And a countywide compact spells out responsibilities of teachers, police, courts. But last week's shooting in Colorado, coupled with last year's shooting at Springfield's Thurston High School, are making school staff, police, parents and students wonder if enough is being done. "Columbine heightens everything," said Medford secondary schools director Dan Zaklan. School officials say their rules governing student behavior are tough, but they're getting tougher. At Eagle Point Junior High, Principal Dennis Quiring has been expelling students who threaten violence. So far this year, six students have fallen to the principal's new rule. Quiring said he was motivated in part by Thurston and in part by concern for the environment in his own halls and classrooms. Teachers can't teach and students can't learn in a threatening atmosphere. He said there have been intangible benefits from the new, tough line: The mood of students and staff seems better. And on Monday, when the girl was asking for a gun, Quiring said, there was a very tangible benefit: The girl's classmates, knowing the rules and knowing Quiring's concern, piled off the bus and came straight to his office. "I'm extremely proud of the kids," Quiring said. "If it hadn't been for the kids, we wouldn't have gotten on this so fast. "We immediately got the student, got her into the office. And this was all done before the bell rang for first period. "Really," Quiring continued, "the hardest part about Monday was dealing with the rumors." Some girls spread widely exaggerated accounts, mothers called about caches of guns they had heard were found in the school. More than a dozen parents wound up withdrawing their kids from school for the day. "There were no guns -- believe me, we searched," Quiring said. "The girl never had a gun." His staff now is reviewing the incident and, talking about whether additional measures may be necessary. In Ashland, school administrators and police are preparing for a first-ever meeting to discuss specific plans of action for violent situations. DeCapua, one of the police officers who will attend the Monday morning session, welcomes what he sees as an opportunity improve school safety. School staffs in general -- not just in Ashland -- have been too reluctant to call in law enforcement in potentially dangerous situations, DeCapua said. A couple of decades ago, when kid fights ended in busted lips and ripped shirts, the light touch of authority worked. Today, as schoolyard horrors confirm, fights are more likely to involve weapons and a larger number of victims, DeCapua said. If there is any silver lining to the tragedies and the aftermath of concern, it is that more people are concerned and are taking more action to make schools safe, said Jackson County Juvenile Department Director Alan Young. For years, Young, like DeCapua, has been concerned that schools were too permissive and too seldom called in law enforcement. By the time a child's behavior deteriorated to a point where police are summoned, juvenile department officers would wind up uncovering a history of trouble. Time and again, Young said, his staff would complain that the school should have reported incidents sooner. Those staff complaints led Young last fall to work up the safe schools compact outlining procedures for handling violent students. It addresses threats and weapons, and sets out responsibilities for reporting and responding. Ordinarily, in a week the department may receive one new case under the compact. Since Columbine, however, the department has received 11 new cases of violence or threatened violence. Medford is handling the prospect of student violence by expanding its ties with Medford police. Zaklan said that at a school-police meeting Wednesday, participants agreed on several measures, including the staging of police drills in schools after hours, so that police are familiar with building layouts. And new curriculum will be written for students, Zaklan said. The goal will be to convince students of all ages that not only is it their responsibility to speak out about violent classmates, but that it is a good thing to do. For North Medford's principal, the most effective answer to violence -- or at least the most promising answer -- lies in speaking up. Lacey urged parents and students to talk about and report suspicions and threats. Medford police and school officials plan to conduct a detailed examination of the recent school shootings with an eye toward pinpointing precursors -- statements, rumors and acts that, if addressed immediately, might have prevented greater harm. Said Lacy, "What is it we know about the shootings that have occurred? All the shootings? "That somebody knew. They knew specific information but they didn't tell. "You have to report everything." Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA