Pass Christian School District holds First Responders Tabletop Exercise

The Pass Christian School District hosted a tabletop exercise for law enforcement agencies and other first responders to coordinate a response to an active shooter according to their operating procedures.

Local and state agencies came together to hone in on a response plan incase an active shooter arrives on any campus in the Pass Christian School District. Pass Christian Fire Chief Dwight Gordon said, “We wanted to get all the parties in the room, discuss over what we have in place, look at any other ideas or anything to upgrade those responses and make sure we are all working together for the safety of our students.”

According to everytownresearch.org, there have been at least 27 incidents of gunfire on school grounds this year, resulting in four deaths and 18 injuries nationally. Pass Christian School District Maintenance and Safety Officer Tim Allen said, “We are not planning for ‘this is not going to happen,’ but we are planning for when it happens. Like I said earlier, we are going to hope and pray it never does.”

Allen says it is important to learn from active shooter incidents in other areas. “So, you take the other incidents and situation and you work on them, you build on them. You use that information. Will it work for us? It may not. Everything is different. You take what you know and you build on it.”

The open conversation allowed the different agencies a chance to offer ideas on what to do and how to combat an active shooter. “We just wanted to bring them and make them a part of it so that they are coming in with a little more knowledge than just showing up and not having a clue what’s going on.”

An active shooter drill will be conducted in the upcoming months.