Starting tomorrow (July 12), Lane Community College will hold a three-day shooter response training course, as well as a drill on its main campus. As KLCC’s Brian Bull reports, a variety of law enforcement agencies will participate in the training coordinated between LCC and the FBI.
The 30 officers taking part represent University of Oregon Campus Police, the Lane County Sheriff’s Office, and the Confederated Tribes of Coos, Lower Umpqua, and Siuslaw Police Department among others.
Jace Smith is Director of Emergency Management and Chief of Public Safety for Lane Community College, which has officers participating in the event.
“Since 2013, there have been over 200 school shootings in the United States," he tells KLCC. "An average of one a week, and according to an organization called Every Town Research.
"The more closely we model this and we train for it, the better we are in the horrible occasion that it might actually happen.”
Smith says trainees will be fired upon during the drill, with flash bangs and “simunitions” – bullets that sting on impact and leave a spot of paint. And some volunteers will play shooting victims. The idea is to create as realistic a scenario as possible.
The event will use a couple campus buildings, and will be off-limits to everyone not involved with the training.
Copyright 2017, KLCC.
