Starting next fall, each middle and high school in the Champaign school district will feature a full-time uniformed, armed policeman as part of the school resource officer program passed by Champaign City Council Tuesday night.

One night after a packed house watched the Champaign school board approve the agreement, the city council drew its largest crowd of the year, many of them parents angrily protesting the idea of having officers with guns in Champaign’s public schools.

The resource officer program, which passed a public council study session in January with little fanfare, will create six positions, three of them filled by newly hired officers, devoted solely to monitoring the schools. Champaign already has off-duty police officers working overtime to monitor hallways during certain parts of the day.

“The (resource officers), unfortunately, are necessary,” said Bill Freyman, the principal of Champaign Central High School. “These are programs that benefit kids and their families and protect our safety when we need it.”

But many of the mothers and fathers at the meeting voiced fears that the officers would “criminalize” their children. They worried that the officer’s weapons would eventually be turned on a student, and some African-American parents openly accused the city of racial discrimination.

“It’s a form of intimidation,” said Nicole Causley, who told the council that her son Tyler had been handled roughly by one of the overtime police officers already working in the schools.

She said the school had sent home newsletters about the marching band and sports teams, but had never told parents that police officers were walking the halls.

“It leads me to believe that extra-curricular activities are more important than the fair and equitable treatment of African-American children,” Causley said.

Arthur Culver, the superintendent of the Champaign school district and an African-American himself, said the need for officers in the schools had been apparent for some time, and had escalated after a series of violent incidents left several faculty injured, resulting in dozens of expulsions.

“Last April I really became fearful,” he said. “I was afraid of the direction things were headed for. I know it’s not popular, but the first and foremost thing on my mind is the safety of staff and students.”

Culver and other supporters of the issue emphasized that policemen were already working with the schools and that most surrounding areas, including Urbana, already had similar programs. They said the resource officer program would improve communication and allow the fulltime officers to establish a relationship with students, offering counseling and guidance.

That idea faced opposition from much of the room, where there was palpable tension between the parents and the police department. Evelyn Underwood, a local reverend, summed up the distrust.

“The police are the police,” Underwood said. “They can’t do counseling.”

But Mayor Gerald Schweighart said the officers, rather than criminalizing children, would improve relations between students and the police department. He said the city and Chief R.T. Finney were trying to build bridges with the minority community, and asked for their aid.

“(Finney) can’t build it alone. He needs your help,” Schweighart said. “If we can’t work together and solve our problems as a community, how can we ever expect to accomplish anything?”

When the item finally made it to a council vote, it passed 6-2, with Marci Dodds and Geraldo Rosales dissenting. Kathy Ennen was absent.

Though the issue first appeared before the council almost three months ago, several members of the opposition referred to it as “rushed” and asked for more deliberation. Many also asked that, if the measure was passed, officers not bring their guns into the schools.

But the vote went through, and Schweighart, a former police officer who was once stationed in schools himself, said parents were merely looking at worst-case scenarios.

“I had a gun for 20 years and never fired it once in schools,” Schweighart said.