By U.S. Rep. Mike Michaud
(D-Maine)
Schools should be a safe place for our children to learn and grow. But we’ve all been shaken, especially parents of school age children, by the Newtown school shooting tragedy.
Since that terrible and senseless attack, our country has engaged in a great debate about the causes of violence and what steps we can take to reduce it. While this has been a fierce and expansive debate in Washington and state capitals across the country, there have been strides made on the local and state level, including right here in Maine. In fact, Penobscot County Sheriff Glenn Ross, Kennebec County Sheriff Randall Liberty, and Oxford County Sheriff Wayne Gallant have been hard at work making our schools safer in the event of an emergency.
In 2009, I secured funding for a pilot program that these sheriffs designed to improve information sharing between law enforcement agencies and school districts. Every school is already required to put together comprehensive emergency plans that outline what to do in the event of a fire, severe weather, or a school shooting. However, these plans can be thousands of pages by the time they are delivered to local law enforcement. When every second counts during an emergency situation, our first responders need access to the information contained in those plans as quickly as possible.
Under the sheriffs’ Multi-Hazard School Disaster Planning and Response initiative, a law enforcement representative visited over 200 schools across Penobscot, Oxford and Kennebec counties to digitize key components of each emergency plan. This information was then uploaded into an electronic record management system, which is now instantly accessible by emergency dispatchers and law enforcement officials. With this critical information literally at their fingertips, law enforcement can now respond to school emergencies faster and more effectively than ever before.
This project has other important outcomes as well. It builds better working relationships between law enforcement and school administrators, and emergency plans are now updated more frequently and in closer consultation with first responders.
Due to the success of this project in Maine, I am currently in the process of drafting legislation to establish a national grant program that utilizes the Maine model. The Multi-Hazard School Disaster Planning and Response Act of 2013 will enable state, local, and tribal governments to apply for funding to digitize the critical elements of their school emergency plans. This is a common sense proposal that will strengthen the ability of law enforcement throughout the country to protect our children while they are at school.
In order to help further, I joined several of my colleagues earlier this year in sending a letter to House leadership calling for additional funding for the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) programs, which provide resources and technical assistance to state and local law enforcement agencies. Maine received $650,000 dollars last year to support the hiring of additional police personnel, and I strongly believe this support must be maintained and improved.
I’d like to recognize and thank all our public safety officials for what they do for our communities and their unwavering dedication to serving and protecting the citizens of our great state. While work remains when it comes to securing our communities from future threats, I believe that ensuring first responders have the resources they need and access to life saving information will get us closer to our goals.
