Norwich — School Superintendent Kristen Stringfellow never realized how often elementary schools might need to call police until she saw first-hand that the new middle school resource officers were being called daily to address matters at one of their designated elementary schools, mostly for issues involving adults.

So last week, the school district hired a third school resource officer to work exclusively with the city’s five elementary schools, allowing the two middle school officers to remain in their designated schools. Officer Jared Homand, an eight-year Norwich police veteran, started full time in the school system Monday.

In February, when the school district hired two middle school resource officers, Homand was selected by Norwich police and school officials as their backup to cover for vacations and sick days.

Each of the two middle school resource officers was assigned lower-level schools to cover as well, one with three elementary schools and the Bishop Early Learning Center and one with four elementary schools.

Stringfellow, who spent two months working at the Teachers’ Memorial Global Studies Middle School this winter as part of an administrative crackdown on discipline there, said she saw how frequently Global Studies Resource Officer Robert McKinney was called to one of his assigned elementary schools. Officers were called for issues such as to investigate child custody issues, potential prohibited objects brought to school or potential cyber bullying issues.

The police department would send a regular beat officer to cover the school, Stringfellow said, but it was a different officer each time, lacking continuity and familiarity with the school.

“I got to see first-hand being at Global, having the officer there as a resource to us and having him taken away to go to the needs of the elementary school,” Stringfellow told the Board of Education Tuesday.

Stringfellow said Homand, who will become familiar with the building layouts of all seven elementary schools and the Bishop Early Learning Center, will help with fire drills and emergency response training in addition to responding to daily issues. He will work in partnership with McKinney and Kelly Middle School Resource Officer Heather Meikle.

Homand will be paid through the regular operating budget for the rest of this school year, with the police department sending monthly bills to the school district, school Business Administrator Robert Sirpenski said. Next year, the board could use federal COVID-19 recovery grant money to cover Homand’s salary and possibly the cost for the two middle school officers as well.

The total cost for the three officers is projected at $375,483. Before the third officer was hired this week, the cost for the two middle school officers, $250,322, was placed in the 2022-23 operating budget to ensure permanence of the cost in the annual budget, rather than using one-time grants. But Sirpenski said the cost for any or all the officers could be shifted to the COVID-19 recovery grant, given that City Manager John Salomone is recommending limiting the school budget to a 1% increase next year.

A combined City Council-school board ad hoc budget committee will meet soon to discuss school budget adjustments.

c.bessette@theday.com