"I still have some questions on how we can improve on the process perhaps," he said.
Nevertheless, Smith noted President Barack Obama issued 23 executive orders last week to support SROs around the country and develop emergency response plans at schools.
"Schools are a priority," he said, adding the problem of gun violence is complex.
"It's not just adding SROs, how we control guns, deal with mental health, it's a combination," Smith said. "We cannot combat this problem until we look at all of those together."
Councilman Bill Martin, a teacher, praised the effectiveness of SROs.
"It's more than just an armed guard. I really don't like using the word armed guard," he said. "It's just a great person to have in a building."
"I feel very frustrated sometimes in the aftermath of what happened in Newtown," Martin said, noting his daughter goes to Meadowvale and two more children go to Havre de Grace Middle School and a kindergarten.
"I felt like I was screaming in a glass bowl when all I heard from our elected leadership was talking about things that I don't think is going to keep somebody safe," he said.
Martin said someone could come into a school with a baseball bat and do the same amount of damage as the young man with an assault rifle at Newtown.
He hopes SROs will be the norm in the country within a decade.
"Let's start tonight," he said. "In Havre de Grace, we don't follow, we lead."
Councilman Dave Glenn, who was not at the last meeting, also said children are "near and dear" to his heart.
"Without a doubt, we got it right," he said. "I view us as the leading change agent. We led the way for everybody else."
Craig also criticized Smith's comment that the process needs to be questioned, saying that in Annapolis, it takes a long time for anything to happen and some items have to go through committees multiple times.
He said he thought it was important to fund the program initially to get the city through March.
"That's how decisions get made here and hopefully that's how decisions will get made, for a favorable outcome for all our schools," he said.
Dougherty also said the advantage of local government is that something can be passed in a short time.
"If you want to get something done, the local level is where it gets done and it gets done right away," he said. "At other levels, I sometimes just shake my head - bickering about what letter's after your name."
"In Havre de Grace, we are very fortunate that we can get a solution, and not a solution that takes months but a solution that takes a very short period of time," he said.
"There comes a point when as an elected official, you have so much feedback coming back, you know you are working for the people and not against the people," Dougherty added.
