California K-12 schools with military-style rifles don’t always disclose them as law requires

Police forces at California’s K-12 schools have quietly been purchasing and using military equipment for decades — and some have yet to comply with a state law requiring them to disclose that to the public.

In 2014, public records revealed the Pentagon had armed California public school police agencies with surplus military gear. The Los Angeles School Police Department, supplied with grenade launchers, assault rifles and an armored vehicle, faced strong criticism from local civil rights groups and relinquished its federally-donated armory by 2016.

But beyond the Pentagon’s surplus program, law enforcement agencies including school police have the option to purchase military-grade equipment on their own. Nine of California’s 21 public school police forces have bought their own stashes of military-grade equipment, including semi-automatic rifles, less-lethal launchers and smoke grenades. Under the state’s Penal Code, less-lethal weapons are devices meant to incapacitate or stun someone without killing them, though some of these devices have maimed and killed in the past.

Five of the school police forces have not disclosed their inventory to the public this year, in spite of a 2021 state law requiring them to do so annually. Two of them, at San Diego Unified School District and Montebello Unified School District , published up-to-date inventory reports after CalMatters asked for them. The remaining two police departments, at Twin Rivers Unified and Santa Ana Unified , released reports for the first time in 2026 after owning the weapons for years.

School districts say these weapons improve police ability to respond to critical incidents and threats, apprehend violent suspects, and help with crowd control. In April, Twin Rivers school police in Sacramento County brought out its military-grade patrol rifles while responding to a shooting at an out-of-district high school where a teenager was killed. At that time, the police department did not have a military equipment policy in place.

Some of the districts with police forces initially denied owning military equipment in response to CalMatters’ questions, but changed their answers when asked to double-check since they had policies listing the equipment.

Los Angeles School Police possess 112 semi-automatic rifles and 104 bean-bag shotguns , according to information provided by district spokesperson Christy Hagen. Hagen did not respond when asked if they plan to report that publicly as required by the 2021 law.

“This equipment is used only in limited, high-risk situations where it is necessary to help protect students, staff, community members, and officers,” Hagen wrote in an email to CalMatters. “It is deployed when needed to safely de-escalate dangerous incidents, reduce risk to everyone involved, and help bring critical situations to a safe resolution.”

The 2021 law does not require police to track or report non-military weapons, such as tasers and “standard issue” semi-automatic rifles. However, district governing boards overseeing school police can subject any additional items of their choosing to the same oversight. Some districts told CalMatters they don’t consider tasers and rifles military equipment despite listing those items as such in their policies.

The Twin Rivers Unified School District Police Department has owned military equipment for over 20 years. But the district’s board of trustees didn’t approve an equipment use policy until May.

District Police Chief David Lugo said at the board meeting that the policy simply brought the department into compliance with state law, rather than granting police newfound authority to be armed.

However, state law requires a governing body’s permission if police want to use or buy military equipment. Permission can only be granted if the desired equipment is cost-effective, the police agency has developed an equipment policy that safeguards civil liberties, and there is no other way to maintain civilian safety. The policy must be approved by the same governing board before the equipment is used, re-approved at least annually, and posted online as long as the equipment is usable.

These requirements, and many more, took effect when Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 481, which aimed to limit the “risks and impacts of police militarization,” especially in low-income and marginalized communities. The law took effect on Jan. 1, 2022, giving police a five-month grace period to comply.

The Twin Rivers district does not perceive a conflict between this law and what Lugo said at the meeting, district spokesperson Zenobia J. Gerald wrote in an email to CalMatters.

Military tools “are not used in the Department’s day-to-day support of District campuses,” Gerald wrote. “They are only used to respond to extraordinary situations such as the presence of firearms or other serious threats on school campuses and active shooter situations.”

Lugo did not respond to repeated interview requests.

At Twin Rivers’ board meeting in May, 14 people used their public comment time to speak about the school police’s equipment inventory. Six attendees, including parents and teachers, protested the adoption of the policy. The other eight commenters, all parents or local residents, spoke in strong support of the district’s military arsenals. Most proponents argued that student safety comes first and school police should take any means necessary to deflect a school shooter.

“The policy is not about militarizing our schools,” said Dianne Kieffer, a board member of a local neighborhood organization. “It’s about preparedness, accountability, transparency, and making sure that the people responsible for protecting our children and our staff and our schools have clear rules, training, oversight and the proper tools if the worst day imaginable ever comes to happen.”

Dean Broussard, the CEO of a security services company, said taking care of the district’s children is more important than people’s personal ideas about police equipment.

“If the time comes, and I hope and pray it never happens, that these officers need to go into a shooting incident, and they don’t have the tools, and they call for (local police) backup, and officers are 15, 20 minutes away … that’s not good,” he said at the meeting. “The immediate response is what we need.”

Parents Kevin and Tricia Hedahl opposed the proposed policy, citing the extensive preparation necessary to safely deploy less-lethal tools and assault rifles usually reserved for war. State law requires the military equipment policy to list necessary training, if there is any, for each weapon.

Kevin Hedahl served in the U.S. Army’s Second Ranger Battalion’s Special Ops unit from 1999 to 2003, and said in an interview that he used the same type of weapons used by Twin Rivers school police in Afghanistan and in the Middle East to breach doors and in combat.

“To be trained to utilize them in a way that we wouldn’t be just randomly killing people was a 24-7 amount of training. We were doing live fire drills on a weekly basis,” he said. “The idea that a police force has access and is able to use these weapons with just this tiny little bit of training just blew me away.”

Others argued that arming campus cops could signal to families that the district sees their kids as dangerous. Diane Roberts, an English teacher at Grant Union High School, said the board should consider how families of Black and Latino students — who comprise over half of the district — feel about assault weapons on campus.

“I think really, really well-trained teachers and school counselors who can do interventions ahead of time is going to be more impactful and help students so much more than (military weapons),” Tricia Hedahl said in an interview. “Conflict resolution and focusing on de-escalation is going to keep so many more people safe and keep it from happening in the first place.”

In July, CalMatters uncovered a massive inventory of military-grade weapons and tools owned by police at the state’s public colleges and universities, and determined that many of the campuses had failed to abide by the state’s strict transparency rules. CalMatters’ continued investigation shows similar failures among K-12 district police forces.

Once military-grade equipment — like less-lethal shotguns, flashbang grenades and drones — is in police hands, that department is required to compile an annual report containing an updated inventory, a summary of equipment uses and filed complaints, the year’s maintenance costs, and an index of planned equipment purchases. The report, filed with the governing body, must also be posted online. Within 30 days of publication, the department must hold a forum where the public can discuss the report and ask questions.

Before CalMatters asked for these reports, five K-12 school police forces — Apple Valley, Fontana, Los Angeles, San Bernardino and San Diego — had not published them in the past year.

Stockton and Montebello published reports in 2025. But even though Montebello held a meeting in April this year, it only published its 2026 report online for public viewing after several inquiries from CalMatters in July. The Stockton Unified School District communications office declined to comment on whether its police department held an equipment forum in 2025.

Twin Rivers police held the mandated forum this year. The Santa Ana school police department, which released its first equipment report this year, did not respond to repeated phone and email inquiries into whether its district held the required meeting. This district’s report also did not list the currently-owned quantities of rifle and bean bag munitions or quantities of less-lethal launchers the department plans to buy.

Santa Ana, Twin Rivers and Montebello’s equipment policies also do not state how civilians can submit feedback and complaints, which the law requires.

Dan Garcia, Montebello’s Administration Services director, told CalMatters the public can express concerns at police town halls and district board meetings. Gerald at Twin Rivers said complaint forms can be mailed or delivered in-person at school. Santa Ana school police did not respond to repeated inquiries about their policy’s missing details.

State law requires military equipment documents to be available online, but the Fontana and Apple Valley school districts both said CalMatters would have to get the documents through public record requests.

Initially, on Aug. 4, Fontana’s public records department stated campus police do not own any military equipment. When CalMatters asked if they were certain, the district responded on Aug. 10 that they would update their 2024 equipment report and submit it to their district board of education this September.

San Bernardino school police also said at first that they have no military equipment. When CalMatters asked again, the district sent an equipment report a few days later.

Under the law, all pieces of military equipment need to be listed in a use policy, along with manufacturer descriptions, necessary training, costs and rules for using the items. The policy must also spell out possible penalties for policy violations.

Campus cops do not have to reveal their taser inventory to the public under the military equipment law. For example, the El Rancho Unified School District told CalMatters that campus police carry Axon TASER 7 devices, which they say provide a less-lethal option if force is necessary, but this information is not required to be disclosed.

However, a 2025 policy from Apple Valley Unified categorizes its tasers, semi-automatic rifles, sponge launchers and munitions as military equipment, but lists no other information about those devices. The district told CalMatters its police department has never produced an inventory report, adding that its tasers and rifles are exempt from the state law, which only requires police to report non-standard semi-automatic rifles and Taser Shockwave devices.

Along with the aforementioned districts, 11 other California public school districts – plus Victor Valley Union High School – operate their own police departments. Several of them, including Victor Valley and the Clovis and Hesperia districts, have published military equipment policies but told CalMatters they don’t own such equipment nor plan to purchase it. Compton Unified attracted criticism from local residents in 2014 when it authorized campus police to carry AR-15s, though district spokesperson John Stouffer said the department never bought them.

Fontana and San Bernardino both told CalMatters they would make and publicize the necessary reports as the school year begins. So did San Diego school police, which submitted a new report to its district’s board of education in August after two years without one.

Phoebe Huss is a contributor with the College Journalism Network, a collaboration between CalMatters and student journalists from across California. CalMatters higher education coverage is supported by a grant from the College Futures Foundation.

This story was originally published by CalMatters and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.