State inspector was able to enter Uvalde school during safety audit

A state inspector appointed to impersonate an “intruder” was able to gain entry to a school cafeteria in Uvalde, Texas, while conducting a mandatory safety audit, the district’s interim superintendent announced this week.

Gary Patterson of the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District reviewed the outcome of the audit at the district’s monthly school board meeting in Uvalde on Monday, where he presented key findings included in a broader end-of-year safety and security report.

Patterson said the state inspector, undergoing a “intruder detection audit,” was able to access the cafeteria of one of the public schools in the district through a door that had not been properly locked. The door, he said, had a defective latch that only closed fully when the door was slammed shut.

Of the three schools that the inspector audited, only one was susceptible to intrusion.

Uvalde now proposing new safety protocols, such as bulletproof windows, metal detectors and hundreds of additional surveillance cameras, as well as new and improved doors.

The safety program was ordered by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott in response to the Uvalde school shooting, which left 19 students and 2 teachers dead.