Buffalo: ROTC: Mandatory Military Service?

Hutch-Tech Prinicpal David Greco (no photo credit on WGRZ website)

ROTC: Mandatory Military Service?
By Rich Kellman, Senior Correspondent

Longtime Buffalo anti-war activist Bruce Beyer didn't want his daughter in Hutch-Tech's Jr.ROTC program, so he opted-out, as rules require. But he says he shouldn't have to do that.

It's supposed to be the other way around," he tells us. "If you want your child to be in Jr. ROTC, you opt into the program, not the other way around.

Hutchinson-Central Technical High School does automatically enroll freshmen in Jr.ROTC. But parents may keep their children out of the program by signing a statement.

Principal David Greco shows us slips of paper held together by rubber bands. "What I have here is a stack of people that did comply."

Greco says about half the eligible students opted out of Jr.ROTC. But the New York Civil Liberties Union says the process of opting out, in effect, makes the program compulsory, mandatory and illegal.

"We're not holding anybody against their will," Lt. Colonel James McNicholas tells us. But as head of the Buffalo Schools Jr.ROTC program, he says the Civil Liberties claim about illegality might be right.

"The New York State education law says parents should have to opt into the program instead of the letter we sent to parents telling them to opt out," he says.

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