‘Hall Pass’ provides added layer of school security

All Arkansas Catholic schools adopting new system to flag sex offenders, deny entry

Published: January 28, 2014

By Dwain Hebda
Associate Editor

Dwain Hebda

Diane McDaniel, secretary at Christ the King School, demonstrates the Hall Pass identification system. A visitor’s ID is scanned by school personnel and the system checks it against state and national sex offender databases.

Dwain Hebda

Diane McDaniel, secretary at Christ the King School in Little Rock, can’t stop gushing about Hall Pass, a security system that all visitors must clear. The new system scans a photo ID and if the visitor is approved, spits out a stick-on visitor’s badge.

“It’s very easy to use, very easy,” she said. “It’s really helpful in keeping track of who’s in the building. I also like it because it helps me learn names and faces, especially of our new families.”

Initially, she can’t name any drawbacks or call to mind any complaints by parents or other visitors, but when pressed, she leans forward and lowers her voice.

“Well,” she said. “There have been a few who have said, ‘Oh what an awful picture.’” She adds with a broad smile, “But that’s the driver’s license’s fault, we can’t control that.”

Soon, parents in all Catholics schools in Arkansas will get a chance to wince over arguably their least-flattering photo stuck to the front of their shirts, as Hall Pass is currently being adopted diocese-wide. Hall Pass has been in place at Mount St. Mary Academy and Christ the King School for some time, four other schools are now fully up and running and 11 other schools are in various stages of implementation. The system is expected to be fully implemented in all 28 schools by the end of the school year.

“Our schools already have restricted access, people are supposed to report to the office, and they keep emergency doors barred from the outside so people can’t get in from the outside,” said Deacon Bo McAllister, chancellor of canonical affairs who oversees the diocese’s safe environment program. “The whole thing about Hall Pass is that it’s designed to help screen the people coming into the school.”

Visitors are required to show a government-issued photo ID card, preferably a driver’s license, but can also be a military ID or “green card.” School personnel scan the ID and the system performs what McAllister called a “quick and dirty” background check of state and national sex offender databases. If the prospective visitor is on one of those databases, this status appears on the screen and the visitor is denied further access to the building.

“We prefer driver’s licenses because it will go to the state agency and pull up that person’s picture from the DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles) of the individual,” he said. “The person that is doing the screening can see right away if the photo is of the same person who’s standing there.”

The cost for installing the system, which is being paid for at the diocesan level, is around $40,000, McAllister said. Given its demonstrated effectiveness, it may be the best money the diocese ever spent. Last year at Christ the King, the system flagged a service man from a local heating and air conditioning company as a registered sex offender in Texas who had failed to register with Arkansas authorities unbeknownst, it turns out, to his employer.

McAllister said vendors who aren’t willing or able to provide services via people with acceptable backgrounds will find it tough sledding doing business with Catholic schools in Arkansas.

“I haven’t discussed what our vendors think about this new program and quite frankly, I really don’t care what they think. This is how it is,” McAllister said. “I’m assigned to Christ the King, I’m a deacon and I get accompanied wherever I go because I’m not a person who’s normally supposed to be there.”

Hall Pass can also be customized to include special information about special pick-up and drop-off situations, such as those in families going through custody disputes or for those individuals whose access to the school should, in the view of administrators, be curtailed for some reason other than a background issue.

“Some of our schools, we have problems with divorced parents and custody issues,” McAllister said. “Information regarding the custodial arrangements, who has access and approval to pick up the child, that can all be programmed into the computer so when a person comes to check out a child, the school has a way of checking.”

The idea for Hall Pass was formed when Mark Mobley, company president, was waiting to board a plane. As he sat at the gate watching passengers produce photo IDs to get on board, a thought struck him.

“I saw all these steps that people had to go through because we were trying to keep someone from flying the plane into a building,” he said. “I thought, why can’t we do this at the school level?”

Today, the product is in use in schools and hospitals coast to coast, including several public school districts in Arkansas. Though Dallas-based, the Mobley family has deep roots in Arkansas, even to the point of operating a Little Rock office headed by Mark Mobley’s brother, Matt. One of the company’s promotional videos was filmed at Mount St. Mary.

“You can ask the people in our call center, they all know the place Arkansas holds,” Mark Mobley said. “It was a pleasure and a privilege to serve the diocese and when they gave their approval, I wouldn’t have been happier if the New York City school district had said yes. We were just ecstatic about it.”

Click for the Catholic Schools Herald -- January 2014 index