Church Violence Website

Posted on October 23, 2011 Written by

I found a website that deals exclusively with church violence, Church Crime History. I do not know this person so I’m not endorsing it but he has a lot of information and statistics. I believe that his purpose (and mine, frankly) is to make people aware that churches can have violence. Information is always good – information can be used to help members be more aware of what is happening in other churches. Share this resource with whomever you feel it would help to know about this.

Let me encourage church leadership to take some pro-active steps for safety and security. The depth of those actions is dependent on the church’s budget and the perceived potential danger to the church and its people. Some actions won’t cost the church a dime (such as setting up a Safety Officer Team) while others are much more expensive (such as security cameras). It is true that many of the items listed in Church Crime History could never be prevented – no argument there – but some precautions are always a good step in the right direction.

Lead On!
Steve

Filed Under: buildings, church safety, church security, facilities Tagged: , , ,

Safety Officers

Posted on October 1, 2011 Written by
Just over three years ago I established the Safety Officer Team at my church. No one asked me to do this, I realized the need for this after reading an article about the number of shooting deaths in churches. From 1999 to 2007, 41 people died in churches from gunfire. This does not include violent deaths at church-related camps or other properties nor does it include violent deaths by means other than guns (such as the poisoning of the church coffee pot in a New Hampshire church that killed one person). This figure does not include the scores of people wounded in shootings such as the two pastors wounded in September 2011 in a church in Florida.
 
Churches used to be considered sanctuaries (in every sense of the word). Churches are no longer immune from violence. Instead, churches must be proactive in protecting their facilities when so many people are present. Churches can do this in several ways:
  • Volunteers – these are typically members of the church who have had or are currently police officers.
    • I  discourage the use of members of the military. I greatly respect members of the armed forces, but typically they are trained to shoot first and ask questions later; police are trained to ask questions first and shoot only as a last resort.
    • Members who have neither police nor military training could be a risk the church should not take. My “risk-management hat” tells me that some untrained members may be either trigger-happy or trigger-reluctant and either situation can put people at risk.
    • Police (current or former officers) are probably the best way to go because of their training. This also gives police officer members of the church the opportunity to give back to their church using their professional training – something that many of them want to do but have never been asked to do.
  • Off-Duty Paid Officers – This is the best form of protection but it is also the most expensive. These officers can be either in uniform or in plain clothes or a combination. 
    • Some churches use traffic officers to help with getting cars out of the parking lot; those officers are the first line of protection for a church. Someone bent on harm may see a traffic cop and choose another, less guarded, site and bypass your location. 
    • High profile ministers usually have an officer that is assigned to be with the minister to ensure no one causes harm to him or his family while the minister is on the church’s campus.
    • Paid plain clothes officers are usually used in large churches where an officer’s presence is needed in a worship environment but where the church members do not need to be alarmed by the number of police. 
    • Sometimes a church will learn of a threat against a minister or the church itself. You need to decide how you’ll address that threat and there isn’t an easy answer. Every threat needs to be addressed individually.
      • Do you ignore it? A foolish action (in my book)
      • Do you bring in only volunteers? A good move but not far enough
      • Do you bring in paid officers in uniform? That is a great move but it does have consequences. The person making the threat may see the officer and decide to postpone the attack nor even cancel it. It may also alarm church members who are not used to seeing a uniformed officer.
      • Do you bring in a paid undercover officer? That is also a great move. It will not alarm church members but it does have the drawback in that the person causing the threat may continue with his (or her) attack.
  • Combination of volunteers and paid officers – This is probably the most efficient and effective method. 
    • It is an efficient use of church funds by using volunteers inside the church and a paid traffic officer. When (not if) there is a threat or there is a perceived need for increased vigilance, additional paid officers can be brought in.
    • It is effective in that the first line of defense is always the most visible officer – the traffic cop in the parking lot.
    • This is the way that I’ve gone to – I like and it works quite well. We’ve weathered 2 intentional threats and the heightened security around 9/11/2011. 
Below are the Safety Officer Guidelines that I created for my volunteer officers. My regular paid officer sees these guidelines, too. By the way, as my way of thanking them for their service, I meet with them once a year (the only official meeting I have with them). I invite them all, volunteer and paid officers, to lunch and I pick up the tab. I want them to get to know each other so that all the good guys to know each other – some churches are so large that police from different jurisdictions have never met each other. Take your volunteer officers to lunch – they’ll enjoy it, you can take the opportunity to acknowledge and express appreciation for their community service, everyone will get to know each other better and you can remind them of why they are so needed and vital to the church.
 
Lead On!
 
Safety Officer Guidelines
Overview
  1. The purpose of the Safety Officers for our church is for passive not active threat assessments leading to actions only if absolutely necessary. Passive action means observing individuals but not approaching or engaging the individual unless a specific threat is noticed.
  2. Only trained law enforcement (present, former, or retired) should be included as a Safety Officer of our church.
  3. Safety Officers may carry weapons on church grounds but that is typically not necessary.
  4. Safety Officers may wear uniforms but that is not typically necessary.
  5. Safety Officers must know who else is a member in order to assist or recognize another officer during a crisis. 
Responsibilities
  1. Whenever a Safety Officer is present at the church, he/she must consider him/herself to be “on duty” and available to respond.
  2. Safety Officers must be aware of individuals who have the potential to harm others. If a Safety Officer notices an individual believed to be a threat to others, he/she should approach the individual to determine the danger. If the danger is real, then the Safety Officer.
    1. Should summon on-duty officers (call 911)
    2. Maintain personal or visual contact of the individual until on-duty officers arrive
    3. Attempt to get other Safety Officers to help with the situation
    4. As a last resort, escort the individual out of the building if the person becomes disruptive
  3. Safety Officers should be aware that many times dangerous individuals want to gain a reputation or fame for themselves and their actions. The most prominent person in the church, and thus the most likely single target, is the senior pastor. If a Safety Officer notices an individual approaching the pastor during the worship service, the officer should walk forward to see if he/she can be of assistance.
    1. During the music – pastor may be approached by staff trying to tell the pastor some emergency. Only rarely will anyone else approach him.
    2. During the sermon – this is a high visibility time for an individual wanting to gain fame. Only rarely will anyone else be on the platform
    3. During the “altar call” – this time is when the pastor is most vulnerable since people are encouraged to come to him. Someone dangerous could get within inches of the pastor and not draw any attention.
  4. Safety Officers should not draw attention to themselves or their position unless a threat is imminent.
  5. Safety Officers should get to know each other and the church-hired traffic officer.
  6. The work of Safety Officers will go entirely unnoticed and unrecognized by the church. But please know that those people who are aware of your work greatly appreciate your service. It helps the staff and church do its work with peace of mind – thank you!
Lead On!
Steve
Filed Under: church safety, church security, leadership Tagged: , ,

9/11 – 10 Years Later is on a Sunday

Posted on August 23, 2011 Written by

This year the anniversary of 9/11/2001 is on a Sunday. Churches will be filled with people as on every Sunday and many churches will make note of the sacrifices of the people working in the Trade Center Towers, the Pentagon, and the four airplanes. Hopefully they will also recognize the first responders (fire and police personnel) who rushed into the burning buildings only to have the towers collapse and kill them.

While it would not be appropriate to either trivialize the significance of 9/11 in American history, it is also not right to make it a jingoistic or nationalistic event. That day was one of the worst terrorist attacks but it was preceded and followed by scores of other terrorist attacks across the world (Nairobi, Madrid, London, Oklahoma City, Bali, Beslan, Mumbai, etc. to name but a few of the most infamous and deadly). The attacks are the feeble attempt by a few to disrupt lives and impose their ideology on others.

For 9/11, I’m asking our members of the church’s Safety Officer Team who are active duty police officers to come in uniform (with weapons) and with a marked car. Ostensibly this is to remind people that on 9/11/2001 it was the first responders who voluntarily went into the burning towers and to their deaths. The other reason for very visible officers is to deter someone from attacking the church. Of course, our regular traffic officer will be on the street with his marked car, too. There has been much speculation that Al-Qaida or some other organization or person wanting to make a name will attempt a terrorist event on this upcoming anniversary.

Inside the church’s lobby, I’ve suggested that we have a poster for people to sign and write notes on. Actually, we need four of them because Sunday afternoon, we can take each of these four posters to the three fire stations and one police station who take care of our church. This will be our way of thanking them for their service to us but also to say that we remember the day they lost so many of their brothers and sisters.

Let me encourage every church to have some acknowledgement on 9/11 of the first responders in their area – that is a great tribute to those who died 10 years ago. But let me also encourage you to take precautionary measures to discourage terrorists.

Lead On!

Steve

Filed Under: church safety, church security Tagged: ,

Safety and Security

Posted on June 20, 2011 Written by

Last weekend I handled a credible death threat to one of our ministers – this was a first for me. The good news is that everything that I had put in place several years ago worked. The minister and family were well protected and all are safe. The minister and I will see if we need to continue the the protection and the alert or if the threat has dissipated enough. Some threats may never go away – they just diminish in intensity.

There are two factors to church safety and security: passive and active.

Passive measures are related to technology

  • Cameras:
    • I installed over 30 cameras throughout our facilities. All exit doors and hallways have a camera. The camera is facing toward the inside the building so as to capture the image of everyone leaving the building. The important thing is not who comes into our buildings but who leaves and what or with whom they are leaving, especially if it is a struggling child.
    • Recently our state police gave us a security check-up (free, by the way – ask for one from your police department). They made several good recommendations but when they saw the quality of image from our cameras, they were impressed. They commented that our images are better than Wal-Mart or Bass Pro Shops – that pleased me.
    • The cameras work. About every two years I catch early teens on camera doing something they shouldn’t. Just last November, I caught two 13 year old who pulled a fire alarm. The kids left the church immediately but through the camera images, we identified the kids. Within 40 minutes the youth pastor called their homes asking them to “man up.” Word got around the youth that the church has cameras everywhere.
  • Kid ID
    • Every church should use some check-in system for children so that to retrieve a child, you have to have a matching card. This is a very simple system and inexpensive to implement. It is not foolproof but it is an effort to ensure that a child leaves only with someone who has the correct documentation.
    • More advanced systems use technology. When a family arrives at church, the parents check-in and a document is printed for both the parents and another document is printed in the classroom where the children are going. Some check-in systems use biometrics (such as a fingerprint – because you can’t forget and leave your fingers at home) to generate the documents for each child. These are very good systems – so long as the staff and volunteers are trained in using them and actually follow them. Training is the key!
    • Another technology is that of buzzer like in a restaurant. This is done in addition to the above systems. When a non-verbal child is checked in, the parents are given the option of receiving a buzzer. If the childcare workers need to get in touch with the parents for whatever reason, they can buzz the parents. The parents can be summoned quietly (without bothering anyone else) and they can be reached anywhere in the building (within a quarter mile). Buzzers are better than displays because it can reach a parent who is in a bathroom, a hallway, or anywhere.

Active systems involve personnel and there are several layers to the personnel.

  • Hall monitors
    • In children’s areas, there should always be a hall monitor who knows the teachers and staff. This person’s job description is to ensure that unauthorized people are not wandering the children’s hall(s). This person can also be greeter or an additional set of hands to fetch things from the resource room but his or her primary job is to keep out unnecessary people.
  • Paid Uniformed Officer
    • Many churches have a Sunday morning cop to direct traffic. But this officer has another, unseen, and far more important role – being a deterrent. If someone bent on evil sees a police officer directing traffic, this person may decide to go to the next church instead of wreaking havoc on your church (sorry for the next church!).
    • The officer is directing traffic only about 30-45 minutes on a Sunday morning even though we pay for three hours (the minimum allowed by the police department). So, the rest of the time, I ask the officer to come inside the building to get coffee, get to know the greeters, let the greeters get to know him, and be seen by members of the church so they’ll feel comfortable knowing they are in a safe place.
  • Safety Officer Team
    • This team consists of only current or former police. Military are excluded because their training is to shoot and then ask questions; police are trained to use words first and bullets only as a last resort.
    • My sole request for the team members is that when they come to church, they continue to be police officers and not let down their guard. None of them come armed except when I ask them to. Team members are in all of our services, both traditional and contemporary.
    • The team meets once a year when I invite them to lunch as a way of saying thanks – it is also a time for me to remind them of the seriousness of their volunteer jobs. An important function at the lunch is for the members to get to know each other so they all know who are the other good guys. At the first lunch, a state trooper of 40+ years met a city policeman of 36+ years for the first time even though they sit only five rows from each other.
So, what did I do this past weekend
  • I asked two members of my safety officer team to come armed to church.
  • I hired a plainclothes police officer whose job was to watch over the minister in all services
  • I alerted the local police department
  • I keep the minister and other key staff informed of what I was doing
  • I met with the paid officer and volunteer on Sunday morning to ensure everyone knew what to do
  • One of my safety officers tracked down the person who made the threat and got a photo of the guy so that he could identified (he was a marginal attender)
  • I authorized the police to forcibly remove him as a trespasser if he came to our church
All is well, for now, and that is a very, very good thing!

If you think I’m overreacting by implementing all that I’ve done, let me give you one statistic: from 1999 to 2007, 41 people died in churches (not including church-related facilities like camps) from gunshots alone (not including blades, poisoning, or other means). Gun violence in church is real. A church is no longer a safe sanctuary from the real world. Do a safety and security check on your church; consider implementing the systems listed above; and do not rely only on “God’s protection” to take care of you.

Lead On!
Steve

Filed Under: church safety, church security Tagged: ,
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