greatly expand funding for the Department of Justice's COPS Safe Schools Initiative to help prevent school gun violence.

In the wake of the events in Newtown, CT, it is evident that it has become necessary to greatly increase the police presence in every school in the United States and that current budget constraints of counties and municipalities make that economically impossible. The US Department of Justice has a program called the COPS Safe Schools Initiative in which it provides funding for police agencies to place police officers in the schools located within their jurisdictions. We ask the Obama administration to quickly seek expanded funding for this program and to ease the burdensome application and reporting processes associated with it. The safety and future of our children depends on it.