A Focus on Customer and Employee Safety - Critical Incident Response Program

About the Program

Category: Risk and Emergency Management (Best in Category)

Year: 2017

The Critical Incident Response Program is a three-tiered practical and training approach: to create a safer work environment for our employees, to train our employees on response to critical incidents, and to promote and provide an external training program for our residents and visitors. The program began as an opportunity to conduct a serious examination of our security infrastructure following the deadly shootings in San Bernardino, California in December 2015. A collaborative team was established consisting of the Divisions of Police and Fire and the Department of General Services, which is tasked with site administration and management of the organization’s physical buildings. The team conducted site surveys at those department buildings that were determined to be most at-risk and presented those findings to the affected department heads, Police and Fire Chiefs, and the County Manager’s staff. Based on these surveys and further discussions, the team developed an internal training program for over 4,000 county employees. This program was first presented to department heads and key officials and later delivered electronically to all county employees. The training program focused on response to active shooter incidents, suspicious packages, vehicles, and persons, and the “See Something, Say Something” campaign. The county also produced a training video for our residents and visitors covering the same material. The video has been aired on the local cable-access channel and has been presented in a training format to over 25 businesses and community groups thus far. Lastly, the public-safety team has worked collaboratively with Henrico County Public Schools’ (HCPS) administration to improve the collective response to critical incidents at schools. This partnership has resulted in the development of improved procedures for Fire, Police, and HCPS to include a full implementation of the Incident Command System (ICS) for all responding agencies.