HILTON, N.Y. (WROC) — After a second bomb threat to the Hilton Central School District, students and staff were able to remain in their classrooms Friday, but it was still an abnormal day. Wednesday’s bomb threat prompted the evacuation of all their buildings.
Friday evening, the Hilton Central School District hosted a virtual meeting and took in concerns from parents and students, (however, they would not talk about the novel, “This Book is Gay”, saying there is a separate process for that). This meeting was focused only on the nature of the threatening emails and what the school plans on doing should this happen again.
Superintendent of Schools, Dr. Casey Kosiorek, said Hilton was made aware of the second bomb threat at 7:20 Friday morning from law enforcement.
“The threat at that time was not deemed credible by the Monroe County Sheriff’s Department, but they decided to deploy the K-9 units out of an abundance of caution,” he said.
Once cleared, students entered their buildings with a delayed start– classes and activities resumed. The threat he says was the same as Wednesday’s.
“With the exception of one additional line, threatening to throw Molotov cocktails into district offices,” said Kosiorek.
Parents and students emailed their concerns in– with some complaining about confusion and phones calls to them being delayed. The school says they are aware.
“In part, redoing our entire network– infrastructure– is one area we will be able to make improvement,” said Ned Dale, Assistant Superintendent for Human Resources.
The school did say the email domain was the same one from Wednesday, which likely originated outside of the US. Parents also asked if the police have any leads here.
“At this time, they don’t have any ties to anyone here locally,” said David Inzana, Hilton Safety and Security
Additionally, are other schools getting these threats regarding this book? It turns out, yes.
“A school in Iowa received a threat and was sent home for the day,” said Kosiorek.
And if this happens a third time, what’s the plan? Kosiorek says they want to find a balance between this disruption, and letting learning continue.
“The strategies that we have, unfortunately, I don’t feel comfortable sharing with the community.”
But he wants everyone to know this: “We do not want to be bullied or intimated as a community. And what these people want us to do is to continue to cancel school,” he said.
This weekend, the school plans to meet with law enforcement to continue to refine its plans should this happen again.
