2021 Georgia Code
Title 20 - Education
Chapter 2 - Elementary and Secondary Education
Article 27 - Loitering at or Disrupting Schools
§ 20-2-1185. School Safety Plans; Drills

1. Every public school shall prepare a school safety plan to help curb the growing incidence of violence in schools, to respond effectively to such incidents, and to provide a safe learning environment for Georgia's children, teachers, and other school personnel. Such plan shall also address preparedness for natural disasters, hazardous materials or radiological accidents, acts of violence, and acts of terrorism. School safety plans of public schools shall be prepared with input from students enrolled in that school, parents or legal guardians of such students, teachers in that school, community leaders, other school employees and school district employees, and local law enforcement, juvenile court, fire service, public safety, and emergency management agencies. As part of such plans, public schools shall provide for the coordination with local law enforcement agencies and the local juvenile court system. School safety plans shall include, at a minimum, the following strategy areas:
   1. Training school administrators, teachers, and support staff, including, but not limited to, school resource officers, security officers, secretaries, custodians, and bus drivers, on school violence prevention, school security, school threat assessment, mental health awareness, and school emergency planning best practices;
   2. Evaluating and refining school security measures;
   3. Updating and exercising school emergency preparedness plans;
   4. Strengthening partnerships with public safety officials; and
   5. Creating enhanced crisis communications plans and social media strategies.

      School safety plans of private schools may be prepared with input from students enrolled in that school, parents or legal guardians of such students, teachers in that school, other school employees, and local law enforcement, fire service, public safety, and emergency management agencies. Such plans shall be reviewed and, if necessary, updated annually. Such plans of public schools shall be submitted to the local emergency management agency and the local law enforcement agency for approval.

2. A public school may request funding assistance from the state for facilities, technology, or other safety improvements or initiatives, such as the installation of safety equipment, including, but not limited to, video surveillance cameras, metal detectors, alarms, communications systems, building access controls, and other similar security devices. The Department of Education shall establish criteria that will be applied in reviewing funding requests pursuant to this subsection which shall take into consideration the physical security needs of the public school in evaluating how the school safety plan and funding request will support such physical security needs. Funding may be provided to a public school in accordance with a school safety plan prepared by the school and approved by the local board of education, the local law enforcement agency, the Department of Education, and the Georgia Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency; provided, however, that a public school shall be required to match the state funding with local funds unless the school can demonstrate a substantial hardship.
3. School safety plans prepared by public schools shall address security issues in school safety zones as defined in Code Section 16-11-127.1. School safety plans should also address security issues involving the transportation of pupils to and from school and school functions when such transportation is furnished by the school or school system and school functions held during noninstructional hours.
4. The Georgia Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency shall provide training and technical assistance to public school systems, and may provide this same training and technical assistance to private school systems and independent private schools throughout this state in the area of emergency management and safe school operations. This training and technical assistance shall include, but not be limited to, crisis response team development, site surveys and safety audits, crisis management planning, exercise design, safe school planning, emergency operations planning, search and seizure, bomb threat management, and model school safety plans.
5. Every public school shall conduct drills with students, teachers, and other school personnel on the execution of school safety plans in such form and at such intervals based upon guidance from the Georgia Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency.

(Code 1981, §20-2-1185, enacted by Ga. L. 1994, p. 1012, § 3; Ga. L. 1999, p. 379, § 1; Ga. L. 2014, p. 432, § 2-12/HB 826; Ga. L. 2014, p. 599, § 3-5/HB 60; Ga. L. 2016, p. 91, § 3/SB 416; Ga. L. 2018, p. 753, § 2/HB 763.)

The 2014 amendments. The first 2014 amendment, effective July 1, 2014, deleted "paragraph (1) of subsection (a) of" following "as defined in" in the first sentence of subsection (c). The second 2014 amendment, effective July 1, 2014, made identical changes.

The 2016 amendment, effective July 1, 2016, inserted "and Homeland Security" in subsections (b) and (d); and inserted a comma following "equipment" in the first sentence of subsection (b).

The 2018 amendment, effective July 1, 2018, in subsection (a), inserted "juvenile court," near the end of the third sentence, added the fourth and fifth sentences, added paragraphs (a)(1) through (a)(5), and added "and the local law enforcement agency for approval" at the end of the last sentence; substituted the present provisions of subsection (b) for the former provisions, which read: "A public school may request funding assistance from the state for the installation of safety equipment, including, but not limited to, video surveillance cameras, metal detectors, and other similar security devices. Funding may be provided to a public school in accordance with a school safety plan prepared by the school and approved by the local board of education, the Department of Education, and the Georgia Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency."; deleted a comma following "private school systems" in the middle of the first sentence of subsection (d); and added subsection (e).

- Carrying weapons within certain school safety zones and at school functions, § 16-11-130.1.

Georgia Information Sharing and Analysis Center, § 35-3-20.

- Ga. L. 1994, p. 1012, § 1, not codified by the General Assembly, provides that the Act shall be known and may be cited as the "School Safety and Juvenile Justice Reform Act of 1994."

Ga. L. 1994, p. 1012, § 2, not codified by the General Assembly, sets forth legislative findings and determinations for the "School Safety and Juvenile Justice Reform Act of 1994."

Ga. L. 1994, p. 1012, § 29, not codified by the General Assembly, provides for severability.

Ga. L. 1994, p. 1012, § 30, not codified by the General Assembly, provides that the Act shall apply to all offenses committed on or after May 1, 1994.

Ga. L. 2014, p. 599, § 1-1/HB 60, not codified by the General Assembly, provides: "This Act shall be known and may be cited as the 'Safe Carry Protection Act.'"

- For annual survey of local government law, see 58 Mercer L. Rev. 267 (2006). For survey article on local government law, see 59 Mercer L. Rev. 285 (2007). For article, "Students, Security, and Race," see 63 Emory L. J. 1 (2013). For article on the 2014 amendment of this Code section, see 31 Ga. St. U.L. Rev. 47 (2014).

JUDICIAL DECISIONS

Liability of officials.

- Trial court properly granted summary judgment to a county school board and the board's superintendent in a parents' negligence action arising out of an attack on school grounds that injured the parents' child as the board and the superintendent presented sufficient evidence that a school safety plan was in place at the elementary school at the time the child was attacked, entitling the board and the superintendent to official immunity barring the parents' negligence claims. Leake v. Murphy, 284 Ga. App. 490, 644 S.E.2d 328 (2007), cert. denied, 2007 Ga. LEXIS 671 (Ga. 2007).

Appellate court's reversal of a grant of judgment on the pleadings to defendants, the members of a school board of education, a school principal, the assistant principal, and a clinic nurse in their individual capacities, was in error in a negligence suit brought by the parents of a student who was assaulted by another student; the mandated action set forth in O.C.G.A. § 20-2-1185 on the part of a school to create a safety plan was a discretionary duty rather than a ministerial duty, and while O.C.G.A. § 20-2-1184 establishes Georgia's public policy concerning the need to report timely to the appropriate authorities the identity of students who commit certain proscribed acts on school grounds, the statute did not create a civil cause of action for damages in favor of a victim or anyone else for the purported failure to report timely. Murphy v. Bajjani, 282 Ga. 197, 647 S.E.2d 54 (2007).

- Mandated action set forth in O.C.G.A. § 20-2-1185 with regard to every public school preparing a school safety plan is a discretionary duty rather than a ministerial duty; by so deciding, the Supreme Court of Georgia determined that the holding in Leake v. Murphy, 274 Ga. App. 219 (2005) was incorrect and overruled that holding. Murphy v. Bajjani, 282 Ga. 197, 647 S.E.2d 54 (2007).