(Editor’s Note: The following column was submitted by Rep. Paul Novotny.)

The Minnesota House of Representatives on Monday approved a bill to improve school safety after a change in law last year resulted in school resource officers (SROs) to be removed from many schools throughout the state. 

Monday’s vote is an important first step in making Minnesota schools safer. I am disappointed that it took nearly seven months into the school year before Democrat leadership came to their senses and decided to work with law enforcement and Republicans to find a solution. This issue could have been resolved in the summer if not for the anti-law enforcement voices in the Democrat party that get louder and louder every day.

The issue traces back to an omnibus education bill (HF 2497) Democrats enacted in 2023 that imposed prohibitions on the use of force in schools, banning certain physical holds by “an employee or agent of a district, including a school resource officer, security personnel, or police officer contracted with a district.”

Language in the new measure provides updates which exclude SROs as employees or agents of a school district, exclude SROs from the prohibitions on prone restraints and physical holds; revise the “reasonable force standard” and mandate school districts and charter schools use only trained SROs and establishes new training and model policy requirements for law enforcement.

The House approved the bill 124-8 and it now awaits action in the Senate.