MARTINEZ, GA (WFXG) -
One week after the tragic shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, the National Rifle Association broke its silence Friday.
"The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun," NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre said Friday.
The gun rights group wants an armed officer in every school in the country.
That sounds great in a perfect world says Columbia County School Safety Director Chief Lance Poss, but he adds this is not a perfect world.
"If you could have an armed officer in every school, I'm sure you'd love to do it," says Fox 54's Jake Wallace.
"Oh yeah, absolutely. Who wouldn't? That'd be great," says Chief Poss. "In a real world, that's probably not going to happen."
Poss says the main road block are budget woes.
"With funding the way it is today, it's almost kind of impossible to do that," he says.
What he and other school safety officials around the CSRA have had to do is adapt.
In Columbia County, eight officers like Duke Smalley cover a cluster of between three to five schools.
All eight are armed.
"If someone comes from outside with a weapon, that would give me the opportunity to meet their force with the type of force we're equipped with," Smalley says.
He says having officers like himself in the schools helps fill two critical needs.
"Safety and giving people an assurance that I'm going to be the first line of defense when something happens," he explains.
Poss says though they aren't able to have an armed officer in every school at the moment, he feels their current setup is keeping students safe.
"We do put safety first and we put a lot of effort into it," he says.
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