Community Safety and Security Team: a community Threat Assessment Team Process

About the Program

Category: Risk and Emergency Management (Best in Category)

Year: 2014

Often with a community act of violence, no person or group that had all of the information necessary to determine there was a high risk of harm even though many individuals had some piece of information that would have contributed to a threat assessment. To address that gap, Buncombe County Government took the lead in the creation of a Community Safety and Security Team (CSST). CSST is a collaboration of community stakeholders organized to respond to situations where one or more persons create a dangerous risk of harm to a specific individual, a group of individuals and/or the general public. The CSST has three primary purposes: (1) to receive, evaluate, and investigate information related to a threat and determine the level of risk of harm; (2) to develop a security and safety plan to an identified threat, and (3) make referrals to services designed to mitigate or eliminate the threat. The development of CSST required: • identification of key stakeholders (across government agencies, schools including universities and community colleges, hospitals, and mental health agencies) • development of a Memorandum of Understanding for participating organizations to: o clarify how laws can be used to address a threat within the criminal and mental health system, o legally share confidential information across organizations, and o agree on a governing structure and policies and procedures including the agreement on a Threat Assessment Team Process • the development of a web-based platform to share confidential information across organizations, and • a system for calling a Threat Assessment meeting using web-based technology (video conference call) so emerging threats are managed in real time. Since the signing of the MOU in November of 2013, CSST has successfully addressed 3 acute community safety issues and meets regularly to strengthen relationships across organizations, review scenarios/threats and best practices regarding the threat assessment process.