YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK. Does a National Center for Campus Safety pass the cost-benefit test?

The House has approved creation of an office to help university security forces train for and prevent violent incidents such as those at Virginia Tech [and] at Northern Illinois University.

The National Center for Campus Public Safety would issue grants to campus safety agencies, encourage research into improved college safety and conduct training.

University security forces, including those at Northern Illinois, studied the Virginia Tech shooting, I argue to good effect. There have been subsequent conferences studying the Northern Illinois shooting. Is a middleman necessary?

The mass shootings attract a lot of attention. The daily backdrop of domestic disputes, gang fights, and the ordinary frictions of human interaction pose a different (and very real, at Virginia Tech and at Northern Illinois and I bet everyplace else, including the Ivies) challenge to the safety agencies and different strategies for improving safety, possibly strategies not provided for in the National Center's mission statement (or in the priors of the committees that will allocate the grants.)