How Much Did the Waterloo School Lockdown Cost?

Monday, November 18th was a terrifying day for Waterloo parents, students, and staff.

At around 12:45 PM all of the schools within the Waterloo Community School District were placed on a lockdown. Minutes later, officials from the district issued a statement on Facebook explaining what was going on.

This statement confirmed that this lockdown was a "precautionary measure" and that school would be proceeding as usual. It was described as an "exterior lockdown" so classes continued during this time.

"Please rest assured that the safety of our Waterloo Schools family is critically important, and we will always act out of an abundance of caution to keep students and staff safe," officials said in a social media post.

Get our free mobile app

Officials worked with the Waterloo Police Department to identify and clear the threat.

Just about an hour and a half after the lockdown was issued, it was listed.

Local law enforcement investigated the incident and were able to determine that there was no threat to the Waterloo schools. There is no word on what exactly tipped school officials off to a possible threat, but we will keep you updated if more information comes out regarding that.

Waterloo Parents Frustrated

In the moments after the safety of all of the students and staff were confirmed, a number of parents began questioning the methods of the school district when it came to alerting them on the situation.

However, many parents were informed on the status of the situation via calls, texts, and social media posts on a "need to know" basis.

The district posted in the comments of their Facebook post, explaining why this was done.

"As a school district, we limit the details of threats due to several very important considerations, including safety, legal, and operational factors. While we recognize not having all of the details may feel frustrating, it is our priority to work with law enforcement to ensure the safety of our students and staff," Waterloo Community School District officials said.

"In order to do that, we must balance transparency with the need for safety, privacy, and effective threat management."

How Much Did This Lockdown Cost?

According to a report from Iowa News Now, the lockdown came with a heavy financial cost.

If you exclude the cost of police and first responders, this incident cost taxpayers approximately $211,000. This is based off of data from a school safety firm called TDR Technology Solutions.

These experts said that this estimation is based off of "lost instructional time."

Stay up to date with everything going on in Eastern Iowa and beyond by downloading the free station app from your app store.

Also, do not forget to follow the station across all social media platforms for the latest news updates.