A commentary by a former board chair of the Greater ­Victoria Board of Education.

As students return to classrooms this week across the Greater Victoria School District, another presence is returning as well.

School police liaison officers are once again walking the halls of SD61 schools. Their return is a powerful victory for common sense, community partnership and the parents who refused to be sidelined by a board of trustees unwilling and unable to listen to their constituents.

The decision to bring back SPLOs is a welcome course correction. It comes after the program was abruptly removed in June 2023 by a board determined to demonstrate ideological virtue, not ­practical leadership.

That decision was met with immediate backlash. Parents, teachers and faith-based community leaders condemned the move. Perhaps most importantly, the leaders from the Esquimalt and Songhees nations pointed out that they were not consulted before the removal of a long-standing Indigenous liaison officer who had built trust with their youth.

The school board did not waver. All nine trustees stood by the decision to remove the program until the very end, vigorously supported by the Greater ­Victoria Teachers’ Association.

Despite repeated feedback from ­parents, and thousands in the ­community, the board remained intransigent. When they refused to work with the province and an appointed advisor to develop effective school safety plans, the ­Ministry of Education dismissed them.

Throughout this debacle, the public remained clear: schools are not political laboratories. They are places of learning, growth and safety. Most parents, students and staff wanted SPLOs back.

Why? They recognized the value of long-term relationships between ­specialized officers and student built on respect, visibility and prevention.

Now, SPLOs are returning, and not a single dollar of new spending was required. Two Victoria police ­officers have been reassigned into Greater ­Victoria schools. Six officers from ­Saanich will rotate through 52 schools in total, including 21 in SD61.

Credit is due to recently retired ­Victoria police chief Del Manak. Before becoming chief, he served as a school ­liaison officer himself.

During the height of the debate, he spoke publicly about the value of the ­program and met with school officials in an effort to preserve it. His calm, ­measured leadership stood in stark contrast to the noise of political ­posturing. He knew what the role could offer because he lived it.

This is what good local governance should look like. Not hashtags or slogans. Not theatre. Just problem-solving.

Too many of our school board and municipal decisions in recent years have been driven by performance, not policy. Removing SPLOs was framed as an act of anti-racism, yet Indigenous ­leaders, ­community members and ­frontline ­educators said the exact ­opposite. The decision alienated families and left schools less supported. That is not ­justice. That is ideological ­hardheadedness ­overriding experience.

Governance is not supposed to be exciting. In fact, when done well, it is often boring. It is budgeting, staffing, scheduling and reviewing feedback. It is meeting with stakeholders, making incremental improvements and adjusting course when the facts change.

It is the antithesis of hyperbolic ­political posturing and activism.

This moment should serve as a reminder. We cannot afford performative leadership. We need school board and municipal governments focused on ­service delivery. We need trustees and councillors who listen more than they tweet. We need public servants like Manak who understand that leadership is about relationships, not headlines.

The return of SPLOs is not just a policy reversal. It is a referendum on how ­decisions should be made. It is a signal to all levels of government that ideology cannot replace governance and when it does, the people will respond.

When decisions are made without data, without listening and without ­understanding, they fall apart. When they are made through collaboration, ­adaptation and trust, they endure.

So let us say clearly, and with thanks: This was a good decision. It reflects the will of the people most affected. It ­honours the professionals who served this community well. And it reaffirms that safety, learning and well-being are ­priorities that transcend politics.

Our students deserve environments where they can learn without fear.

Our educators deserve support from professionals trained in ­prevention and relationship building. And our ­communities deserve leadership that responds to them.

To everyone who spoke up — to the parents who pushed, the Indigenous ­leaders who demanded better and the officers who never stopped caring — this is your win.

And to Del Manak, thank you. For showing Greater Victoria what steady, local leadership really looks like.