 The city of Brainerd will soon have a referendum before it that lays out the plans of the Brainerd public schools. Among those items is improving the safety and security of the schools in the modern world. Clayton Castle shows us why improvements are needed and the solutions the district is pitching to solve those issues. Blueprint 181, the referendum that will be put before Brainerd voters in a few short weeks lays out four different areas that will be improved if the issue is passed. And school officials say it's no mistake that improving the safety and security is at the top of the list. It is the first priority is the safety and security of our students and our staff. And so it really is the first thing that we think about when we think about what is it that we want to do to our buildings or for our buildings. Among the improvements in many of the schools is creating a controlled lock to entrance that will require all visitors and persons to check in at an office in order to enter the building. Modern thinking about controlled entrances puts an office suite at an entrance so people actually have to walk into the office before they're allowed to to basically check in to register so people know that they're in the building and have a purpose to be there. When thinking about safety and security it all comes back to access and who has access to what parts of the building. It's time for us to you know think differently about how we allow access to our buildings to keep our kids safe to keep our staff safe and the questions one and two on the ballot address these concerns. One of the many safety and security issues that the district currently faces is the presence of two high school campuses a north and a south campus but officials hope that blueprint 181 will address many of those concerns. We've got kids and staff that are shuttling back and forth all day long and so our south entrance doors for example they just they need to remain unlocked because because of the number of the volumes of people coming back and forth between those two buildings. Throughout the community listening sessions parents have embraced the plans for safety and security because it assures that the school is doing its job of protecting their children. And that's an expectation they have of us is to protect their kids when they when they come to school every day. I think it's also safe to say that it's the district's responsibility to protect its staff and to make sure that the environment that we create in our buildings is safe for staff as well. Election day to vote on the referendum is set for April 10th reporting in Brainer Clayton Castle Lakeland News. If passed the measure would increase the monthly school related property tax on a median home value of $156,200 home anywhere from one to three dollars depending on which of the three questions are passed if all three questions are passed the tax would increase by seven dollars. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland news please consider making a tax deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.