GOSHEN – Responding to the fear of active shooters in schools, businesses and other public places becoming more widespread, Orange County Government has taken action to help educate the public on how to be prepared should they find themselves in such a situation.
At the 911 Center in Goshen on Wednesday, Orange County Government and the Orange County Chamber of Commerce sponsored the county’s first active shooter training to be open to the public.
(l-r) Sheriff Carl DuBois, DA David Hoovler and County Executive Steven Neuhaus
Law enforcement instructors Capt. Anthony Weed and Lt. Duane Lopez, both of the Special Operations Group of the sheriff’s office, walked attendees through the various steps to take in an active shooter situation and showed them graphic re-enactment videos, along with mock-recordings and actual news footage, to help those there imagine the setting of an actual incidence.
District Attorney David Hoovler said the idea of opening the active shooter training to the public is to promote safety as well as to communicate that these situations can happen to anyone, anywhere and individuals should always be prepared.
“You have to be prepared in the ordinary course of your everyday life that these situations can happen,” said Hoovler. “You have to know where the ingress and egress is to the room that you’re in. You have to be aware of your surroundings at all times because of the situation in the world that we live in and I think that the goal here today is to make people aware of that and to train them, the things that they can do to prepare them, if they’re found in one of these situations where they best have the chance to survive and save their loved ones.”
There are several acronyms and mnemonics that stipulate the order and actions one should take in an active shooter situation, but the one being utilized in the training Wednesday was RHF: Run, Hide and Fight, meant to be executed in that order. Individuals are encouraged to run if they are in a safe area. If they are not in a safe area, they should use anything they can to barricade all entrances to the room that they’re in, be quite and hide until a uniformed officer, with an administrator of that building, escorts them out. Should both of those not be viable options, individuals are encouraged to fight, aggressively and confidently engaging the attacker with any available items that can be used as weapons. This, however, is a last resort but, the instructors of the training reiterated to the public that they do, in fact, have the right to defend themselves if an attacker threatens their life.
In addition to the public training, Orange County Government is also making a commitment to the public by offering follow-up visits with the DA, County Executive and Sheriff’s Offices to any school, business or other place in the county that requests it, to do a walk-around of the specific area and provide area-specific advice for active shooter situations.
County Executive Steven Neuhaus said the public has voiced their growing concerns regarding the issue and the county is responding.
“They’ve asked us, a number of people, ‘What can we do to protect ourselves?’; so, we start by giving this two hour lecture, then we follow it up by a personal visit by the Orange County Sheriff’s Office, myself, the DA and our experts walk through the facilities, whether it’s a school, whether it’s a business, whether it’s any type of public assembly place and we walk them through how they can improve the safety and protection of their facility,” said Neuhaus.
