McEachern High School shooting spurs action: Town hall focuses on proactive safety strategies

COBB COUNTY, Ga. - A shooting at McEachern High School has parents taking action. They met on Thursday night for a second town hall to talk about school safety.

Last week, angry and frustrated parents talked about their concerns. This week, they talked about solutions. 

"I think it's important to keep trying to find ways to keep our kids safe. We need to be proactive, not reactive, to what’s going on," said Lola Adesanya.

Parents are still rattled over a shooting in the school parking lot two weeks ago during school hours. A video that circulated on social media and is now part of the Cobb County police investigation shows a fight that escalated into gunfire. Two people were shot.

Parents want to know what is being done to keep their children safe. 

"I want to make sure the school is putting the proper action steps in place to ensure the kids in our school are safe," said Sharon Carter.

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Cobb County School Board member Tre Hutchins organized the town hall. He talked about the suggestions he's received from parents in the last week.

Those include a vulnerability assessment of the campus, having a command center where cameras would be monitored, and using technology to check for weapons. 

Hutchins said he's already been working on a plan to use technology at large sporting events as well as at the school on a daily basis.

"Our stadiums are filled to capacity, and so, one of the requests was that we start looking at technology to detect weapons at those large event to detect weapons. There's technology out there that we don't have to pull the trigger and make a school look like a prison and have metal detectors. There's other technology we can use and give us the same results," said Hutchins.

Many at the meeting seemed to understand it would take everyone working together. 

"We know what the issue is, now we need to come together as parents, as a community, to support the school and ultimately keep our kids safe," said Deleen Adams.

State Rep. David Wilkerson, Cobb County District Attorney Flynn Broady, and Cobb County Police Chief Stuart VanHoozer also spoke at the town hall.