WATSONVILLE >> A contract between the Watsonville Police Department and Pajaro Valley Unified School District to pair school resource officers with mental health clinicians at two of the district’s three comprehensive high schools, as well as an extension of the contract with Aptos High School, will go before the Pajaro Valley school board at its Wednesday meeting.

According to a staff report by Heather Gorman, the district’s interim executive director of student support services, the board received a presentation on the pairing of a mental health clinician with a school resource officer.

“In this model, the mental health clinician and the school resource officer work as direct partners in providing services to better address the physical and social emotional safety needs on campuses,” Gorman wrote.

The district has agreed to reimburse the city of Watsonville in an amount no larger than $291,630 to provide two school resource officers — one at Watsonville High School and one at Pajaro Valley High School — at the two comprehensive high schools within Watsonville’s city limits. The officer at Pajaro Valley High would strictly be part time while the Watsonville High officer would be part or full time, per the agreement.

School resource officers would be taken with investigating crimes that occur on or near the campus that involve students and their school attendance, participating in the district’s Attendance Review Board and serving as a liaison between the district and Police Department, working with district partners in delivering law enforcement-related prevention activities such as gang awareness and School Safety Days, and providing the district with bimonthly invoices at least 30 days before the payment is due.

The agreement would go into effect Aug. 11 and run through June 5, 2026.

The board will also consider renewing an agreement where the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office provides a school resource officer at Aptos High School. The Sheriff’s Office would be compensated $816.18 per day for each deputy sheriff paid to provide a law enforcement presence on campus. The agreement would be effective July 1 to June 30, 2026.

Aptos High has had a school resource officer program in place for years. However, following the 2020 murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer and scrutiny over school resource officer programs nationwide, the board voted 5-2 to dissolve the program that July and replace officers with social-emotional counselors, partly due to budget issues but also the practicality of maintaining an on-campus officer program as schools were in district learning mode in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.

However, following the fatal on-campus stabbing of 17-year-old Aptos High student Gerardo Sarabia in 2021, the board voted 6-1 that year to reinstate the school resource officer program at the three comprehensive high schools, with the added caveat that they would be paired with mental health professionals.

An agreement with Aptos High was approved by the board as part of the consent agenda last year, but it was not without detractors. Several members of the public felt school resource officers did not make campuses safer and felt the money could be spent elsewhere. The item was unanimously approved without being pulled from the consent agenda or having comments from the board.

In other business, the board will consider a resolution stating the district’s intention to issue general obligation bonds for the 2025-26 fiscal year following the November approval of Measure M.

The board will meet publicly at 6 p.m. Wednesday at the Henry J.Mello Center for the Performing Arts, 250 E. Beach St., Watsonville. A closed session will precede the regular meeting at 5 p.m.