9/11 - Site Security Conversation
With today being 9/11 my brain is flashing back to all the national security improvements made since the tragic event so many years ago. Changes were made to airport security, food defense, and so much more.
As safety professionals, security is often lumped into our responsibilities (that should be a separate job in many cases, but I won't dive down that rabbit hole).
I wanted to keep this thread towards the top and ask that we share best practices that your organizations have made over the years and ask everyone to think critically about what is being done to take threats seriously and prevent disasters.
Comments (3)
The Dept. of Homeland Security and their state offices will sometimes conduct various security-related trainings and assessments for free. I used them quite a bit at the chemical plant I worked at in Indiana. They came down and conducted active shooter training, trained our folks on CTPAT requirements and best practices, and performed a brief risk assessment of our facility since we were a global chemical manufacturer.
Many states also have Intelligience Liaison Officers (ILOs), which are volunteers for the DHS. They are intended to be spread throughout the state so that each region of the state has one or more ILOs that can assist with more localized threats. For example, I have been an ILO for about 10 years now and assist with some of the security planning at some of the major events in our larger cities. These ILOs will often be able to share information with you pertaining to your region or city, as well as pass along other relevant information from the DHS.
Luckily for me, my company has it's own security department. It does report up through health & safety. Also, we have a crisis intervention team that works with employees experiencing crises.
DHS has a bunch of great classes. One in particular was very help in understanding security threat. It was called Threat Assessment. It was five day class that included doing field assessments at public sites. My group was assigned to do a threat assessment on an aquarium. We were able to walk around the whole building including the maintenance area without getting challenged once. If you walk around most places with a clipboard and act like you belong there, no one will bother you.
As far as the City I work for, we have our Emergency Response Task Force that handles all of our training and we work diligently with our Police Department. In working with PD, I have been asked to participate in their mutual aid trainings throughout the year.