Updated: Monday, 5:40 p.m.
In a post to social media site X on Monday afternoon, Overland Park Police said items found inside a backpack found on the campus of Oak Hill Elementary School were deemed safe.
The report of a suspicious package drew OPPD’s bomb squad to the school on West 124th Street.
“It was not an explosive nor was it harmful in nature. Items were collected for further analysis,” the OPPOD statement said.
Original story continues below:
The Overland Park Police Department’s bomb squad was called out to investigate a suspicious package outside of Oak Hill Elementary School on Monday afternoon.
Police spokesperson Officer John Lacy said officers were called to the school at 10200 West 124th St. around 2 p.m.
Lacy says a teacher discovered the item.
“The teacher cleared all of the kids away and notified the principal, who called the police,” Lacy told the Post near the school.
Blue Valley School District Director of Communications Kaci Brutto said that once the package was found, all outdoor activities were moved inside for the remainder of the school day.
“Dismissal occurred fairly normally,” Brutto told the Post. “They [school staff] changed the traffic pattern just a little bit; other than that, it was a pretty typical end of the day.”
The bomb squad’s robot could be seen inspecting the package in the far northeast corner of the school grounds along a privacy fence.
Lacy said the FBI was called in to assist with the investigation after members of the Overland Park bomb squad found something that they determined to be suspicious with the package.
“The items that they saw made the guy [on the bomb squad] a little suspicious, and that’s when he wanted to call in [the] FBI, because they’re more familiar with these kinds of things,” Lacy said. “The Federal Bureau of Investigation, they are now on scene to assist us with this device.”
One nearby resident evacuated from her home after police informed her of the nearby investigation. Lacy said officers have not told anyone to evacuate.
“Right now, I don’t think there’s any kind of threat to Blue Valley or anything like that,” Lacy said.
