As a property manager, ensuring the safety and preparedness of your condominium community is paramount. An effective emergency preparedness checklist is a crucial tool in safeguarding residents, visitors, and property during unforeseen events. Here’s a comprehensive guide to help you develop a robust emergency preparedness checklist tailored for your condo.
Understanding the Importance
An emergency preparedness checklist serves as a blueprint for action in the face of various emergencies, including fires, natural disasters, medical crises, and security threats. By having a detailed plan, you can mitigate risks, coordinate responses, and ensure that everyone in your condominium community knows their role and responsibilities during an emergency.
Key Components of the Checklist
Risk Assessment and Planning
Identify Potential Hazards: Assess the building and surrounding areas to identify potential risks such as fires, floods, earthquakes, power outages, and security threats.
Develop Emergency Scenarios: Create scenarios for each identified hazard, outlining specific actions to be taken for evacuation, shelter-in-place, or other responses.
Establish a Command Structure: Define clear roles and responsibilities for property management staff, security personnel, and emergency response teams.
Communication Plan
Emergency Contact List: Maintain an updated list of emergency contacts, including local fire departments, police, hospitals, and utility companies.
Notification Systems: Implement multiple communication channels such as PA systems, emails, text alerts, and social media to inform residents quickly.
Resident Information: Ensure that resident contact information is up to date and that they are aware of communication protocols during emergencies.
Evacuation Procedures
Evacuation Routes: Clearly mark and regularly update evacuation routes, ensuring they are accessible and free of obstructions.
Assembly Points: Designate safe assembly points outside the building and ensure residents know their locations.
Special Assistance: Plan for residents with disabilities or special needs, ensuring they have the necessary assistance during an evacuation.
Safety Equipment and Supplies
Fire Safety: Install and maintain smoke detectors, fire alarms, sprinkler systems, and fire extinguishers. Conduct regular fire drills.
First Aid Kits: Ensure that well-stocked first aid kits are readily available on every floor.
Emergency Supplies: Store essential emergency supplies such as flashlights, batteries, blankets, non-perishable food, and water.
Training and Drills
Regular Training: Conduct regular training sessions for staff and residents on emergency procedures, including fire drills, first aid, and evacuation protocols.
Mock Drills: Organize periodic mock drills to test the effectiveness of the emergency plan and identify areas for improvement.
Feedback Mechanism: Establish a system for collecting feedback after drills and real emergencies to refine and update the emergency plan.
Documentation and Accessibility
Emergency Plan Documentation: Keep a detailed and updated copy of the emergency plan accessible to all residents, preferably in common areas and online.
Signage: Install clear and visible signage throughout the building indicating emergency exits, evacuation routes, and safety equipment locations.
Accessibility: Ensure that all emergency plans and communications are accessible to residents with disabilities.
Collaboration and Community Engagement
Building a resilient community involves collaboration between property management, residents, and local authorities. Engage residents in the planning process through meetings and surveys to understand their concerns and suggestions. Work closely with local emergency services to align your plans with their protocols and resources.
Continuous Improvement
Emergency preparedness is an ongoing process. Regularly review and update the checklist to address new threats, changes in building infrastructure, and feedback from drills and real incidents. Staying proactive and adaptable ensures that your condo community remains prepared for any emergency.
By following these guidelines and creating a comprehensive emergency preparedness checklist, you can enhance the safety and well-being of your condominium community. Preparedness not only protects lives and property but also fosters a sense of security and trust among residents, making your condo a safer and more resilient place to live.
In today’s fast-paced world, the responsibilities that come with managing a commercial property are substantial. One of the most critical challenges that property managers face is being fully prepared for on-site emergencies. At Wincon Security, we understand the importance of having a well-structured emergency preparedness plan in place to ensure the safety of occupants and the preservation of the property. Drawing from our extensive experience with property managers and security services, we have developed a comprehensive guide outlining the key steps to create an effective emergency preparedness plan for your commercial property.
Step 1: Be Prepared to Respond Swiftly
When an emergency strikes, time is of the essence. At Wincon Security, we emphasize the significance of proactive preparation. Implement communication technology that instantly alerts you, first responders, and tenants when an emergency occurs. Keep an updated list of emergency contacts, ensuring quick access to critical services. Your maintenance team should be well-versed in shutting off water, gas, and electricity to prevent further damage. Designate on-site employees to assist tenants with special needs during evacuations. Regularly conduct emergency response drills to ensure your team’s readiness and keep them informed about any procedural changes.
Step 2: Map Out Evacuation Routes Clearly
During emergencies, having clearly marked evacuation routes can make a life-saving difference. Our experts at Wincon Security recommend prominently displaying evacuation maps on each floor, near exits, stairwells, and elevators. These maps should include safety information on avoiding elevators during fires and properly closing doors. Detailed directional information should be placed in hallways to guide occupants effectively. By providing easily accessible information, you can contribute significantly to a successful evacuation.
Step 3: Maintain Crucial Safety Systems
Property managers bear the responsibility of maintaining all building safety systems to ensure they remain in optimal condition and compliant with codes. At Wincon Security, we advocate for routine checks and adjustments by your maintenance teams, supplemented by professional input when necessary. Regularly inspect fire extinguishers, fire sprinklers, emergency lighting, and smoke alarms to guarantee functionality. Perform annual inspections by industry-certified technicians to uphold safety standards. Keep emergency exits unobstructed and update evacuation maps promptly to reflect any layout changes.
Step 4: Keep Tenants Informed and Engaged
While safeguarding the property is essential, prioritizing tenant safety is paramount. At Wincon Security, we recommend fostering open communication with tenants to ensure their well-being. Supply tenants with a comprehensive list of emergency numbers, including your contact details. Include an emergency preparedness packet in tenant move-in materials and update it annually. For multifamily buildings allowing pets, consider distributing Ontario SPCA emergency preparedness decals for windows and doors. In the event of property alterations or changes in emergency procedures, promptly inform tenants to enable effective evacuation.
Step 5: Establish a Reliable Recovery Partnership
Effective emergency planning extends beyond the immediate crisis to post-damage recovery. If you aren’t already collaborating with a disaster restoration company, now is the time to do so. Wincon Security advises partnering with a reputable contractor with 24/7 availability and positive online reviews. Leverage recommendations from other property managers and your insurance carrier to select a full-service, IICRC-certified restoration contractor. Following a personal interview with potential candidates, add the chosen contractor’s contact information to your emergency list.
Trust in Our Expertise
Here at Wincon Security, we recognize the gravity of emergency preparedness for commercial properties. Our commitment to excellence in property management and security services drives us to share our insights for developing robust emergency plans. Drawing from our extensive experience, we encourage property managers to forge strong relationships with emergency responders and seek expert guidance when crafting or enhancing emergency plans. We aim to empower property managers in their pursuit of creating safer and more secure environments for all occupants.
In conclusion, the responsibility of property managers extends far beyond routine tasks. It encompasses the safety and well-being of all occupants, making a well-crafted emergency preparedness plan an absolute necessity. By following our comprehensive guide, property managers can proactively respond to emergencies, safeguard occupants, and minimize property damage. At Wincon Security, we are dedicated to assisting property managers in their journey towards creating secure and resilient commercial properties.
A fire, flood, natural disaster, or an incident involving a disgruntled employee threatening violence. Preparing for an emergency is critical to ensuring the safety and security of employees or residents across your properties. But if that’s the case, why are so few commercial property owners prepared to handle just such an event?
In our experience, fewer than 10 percent of commercial property owners or condominium corporations take proactive steps to develop comprehensive emergency preparedness and disaster response plan (EPDRP). Those that do rarely communicate the plan or conduct drills to ensure that, in the case of an emergency, the action plan is executed properly. To say this is an oversight would be a huge understatement.
It’s critical for organizations to maintain an easily deployed EPDRP to avoid any unnecessary loss of life in the event of an emergency, as well as to mitigate the threat of litigation or penalties for not taking the necessary, reasonable steps to be prepared. Now, you may be wondering—particularly if this is your first time thinking about the topic—how to design an EPDRP. It’s a good question and one that we’re asked whenever we engage a new client.
With that in mind, here are seven steps for designing an emergency action plan that makes sense for your commercial property and assets:
Wincon Security personnel are fully trained to manage on-site emergencies, even when a formal EPDRP hasn’t been drafted.
Assess the risk—This is the critical first step we recommend when developing any EPDRP. Every property is different, and so are the individuals who either work or live there. To fully understand the risk, you’ll first need to understand what could happen in an emergency situation, even unlikely ones. If your building is in a known flood plain or a tornado-prone area, for example, your plan should reflect those potential risks. If yours is a commercial property, assess the risk from the kinds of activities that are conducted on the premises. If you produce chemicals, for example, your risk levels will be far greater than those at a warehouse facility. In addition, do a headcount to determine how many individuals live or work on site. If you’re a condominium corporation responsible for the well-being of thousands of tenants in an ultra-high-rise building (a scenario I discussed in my last post), the complexity of designing an emergency evacuation action plan will be far greater than in a building of fewer than 10 stories.
Ensure full legislative and insurance compliance—Depending on the location of your property, there may be a set of provincially-mandated emergency preparedness rules and regulations that need to be followed in order to ensure full compliance with local legislation and requirements set out by your insurer. Work with your lawyer, HR team and stakeholders such as local fire or police departments to understand your obligations and ensure that your EPDRP not only complies but even exceeds those minimum requirements. The last thing you need in the event of a catastrophic emergency is to face litigation or legislative penalties because you didn’t take the necessary steps to obey relevant laws pertaining to emergency preparedness and evacuation procedures.
Consult with your security firm and appropriate first responders—Again, police, fire, and paramedics are great resources to contact when developing an EPDRP. Whether preparing plans designed to respond to a potentially horrific incident such as a live-shooter scenario at one of your properties, or taking steps to ensure speedy evacuation in the event of a major fire, first responders are obliged to provide information pertaining to legislative requirements and are (at least in my experience) eager to help mitigate risk for property owners, while minimizing the threat of loss of life in an emergency situation.
Of course, your security firm will be another important resource to help develop an EPDRP. Any reputable firm should even be able to offer a templated plan, then assist in customizing it to suit your specific needs.
We often work with clients to prepare a custom emergency action plan just for them.
Train all security staff—This is a critical step. In our case, all Wincon Security personnel are fully trained to manage on-site emergencies, even in cases where a formal EPDRP hasn’t been drafted (we typically work with clients to prepare these plans as part of our onboarding process). Your security team members will usually be your very first responders and will likely be the ones making a call to police, fire or paramedics in the event of an emergency—while also meeting first responders and answering questions when they first arrive on site. Security personnel should be fully trained to handle any emergency incident that could reasonably occur on your property. Remember, every building is different, and its occupant population is unique. An EPDRP must be customized to suit all stakeholders’ needs.
Have a plan to stabilize the situation—So, you have an emergency, your security team helps evacuate the premises and now you have several hundred residents or dozens of employees waiting outside the property for first responders to arrive. Now what? Any comprehensive EPDRP should also have a stabilization plan that includes details on where to shelter accident victims until help arrives on the scene, for example, or a relocation spot in the event of a natural disaster that threatens your property. Simply clearing the building isn’t good enough.
Communicate the plan—Many companies go through the motions of creating an EPDRP, only to let it gather literal or proverbial dust on a shelf or in a hard drive. The only effective plan is the one that your security team, management, staff, and other key stakeholders fully understand. Include an EPDRP briefing in your employee onboarding process, then provide a refresher on the plan at least once a year. We even recommend giving everyone from security staff to rank-and-file employees a brief, basic quiz to ensure they understand key points such as how to exit the building from their workstation.
Practice—Remember those annoying fire drills you used to do in school? Well, it turns out they were a pretty useful tool—and they still are. Be prepared to practice emergency procedures such as having employees or residents evacuate your building, and execute steps laid out in your EPDRP. Drills should be conducted at least twice a year—and at random times—to make sure your people know how to respond if, or when, disaster strikes.
Why you need to prepare a return-to-work security plan now
As lockdown measures are slowly eased across Ontario and the rest of Canada, organizations are preparing to return to the new COVID-19 workplace normal. But nothing is simple when it comes to navigating the uncharted waters of social distancing and industry-wide lockdowns–especially when it comes to developing a return-to-work security plan.
While a return to the business may still be weeks away for organizations in some parts of the province, no one can afford to be idle. As a business owner/leader, you need to start planning today to ensure that your workplace is as safe and secure as possible once your employees return to the fold—and that you comply with all relevant government health and safety rules and regulations.
“It will happen in phases, it will be very complex and it will look different for every organization.”
Bill Knightly, Cushman and Wakefield’s Chief Operating Officer of Global Occupier Services
Security plays a key role
Of course, safety and security planning is about much more than ensuring the availability of sanitizers and protective equipment, ramped-up hygiene practices, or establishing social distancing rules and protocols. Those are, of course, essential foundational elements. But there are many security-related components that need to be addressed in a comprehensive and strategic return-to-work plan, many of which will take time and resources to implement.
Cybersecurity, access control, monitoring employee movements and activities, and secure collaboration practices, are among many items that need to be integrated into a well-architected security plan. The good news is that your security provider can play an important role in helping develop and execute a fully integrated strategy—one that addresses the new (and in some cases, rapidly evolving) demands around health and safety compliance, risk mitigation and technology.
A return-to-work security plan should cover everything from basic policies around distancing rules and staffing requirements (some organizations may resort to staggered hours, for example, or a combined office/work-from-home model to minimize personal contact), to more complex technological initiatives around health monitoring and building access and control.
Analyze cybersecurity vulnerabilities and requirements in your action plan.
Conduct a security infrastructure audit
An integral part of the initial planning stages is a thorough review of infrastructure equipment. Planners need to examine what needs to be improved or updated. Are repairs required due to the protracted pandemic shutdown? This is an especially important checklist item for facilities that have been fully closed for a long period of time.
Organizations will also have to familiarize themselves and their employees with the plethora of new safety protocols that are being introduced, including those established by public health authorities and/or the building managers, or your company itself. With that, extensive retraining for both security personnel and other staff will be needed before doors re-open for business. This will need to be refreshed as new guidelines evolve in the months to come.
Bear in mind that security personnel, in particular, may be required to perform additional services, from temperature checks and entrance/exit screening, to more frequent patrolling and social distancing enforcement.
Analyze cybersecurity vulnerabilities and requirements
With the rapid transition to a work-from-home business model, organizations should also be making time to review their cybersecurity protocols. During the recent, rapid escalation in remote workers accessing cloud-based services from multiple devices, organizations had little time to assess their network security in an in-depth way. Now that you have a bit of breathing space, it’s time to develop or enhance your current digital security strategy as part of your return-to-work plan. This should include a rapid redeployment backup plan in the event of a future shutdown.
A safe and secure workplace will likely involve new technology investments. As you plan, consider the role security solutions can play in reducing touching of surfaces; tracking and tracing movements to quickly isolate and address potential outbreak situations; or responding to social distancing infractions (e.g., alerts when employees enter a restricted area).
There are a number of technology enablers that can be integrated into existing security systems to meet the demands of a post-lockdown work environment and ensure that only authorized employees or visitors can enter your premises. Examples of tools being implemented right now across some organizations include swipe pads on doors, touchless registration, “smart” barriers at entrances and exits, biometric scanners, remote locking systems and pressure sensors, and mobile two-factor authentication.
Additional video surveillance systems, along with thermal scanners and face recognition software can help identify suspected infections while tracking the contact and movements of anyone within range of a potentially infected person.
All of this needs to be supported by HR policies that clearly outline restricted areas, who has access, and policies around travel and sick leave—among others. Work with your HR team and potentially even a qualified labour and employment lawyer, to draft effective policies customized to the needs of your workplace and employee culture.
The key to action planning is planning early and often as the situation evolves.
Getting your workplace ready to reopen
Global real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield has developed a document entitled Recovery Readiness: a How-To Guide For Reopening Your Workplace. It’s a handy starting point that outlines six guiding principles on how businesses can ensure a safe and efficient transition to workplace readiness.
Here is a distilled version of the principles:
Prepare the Building—Implement cleaning plans, pre-return inspections, and HVAC and mechanicals checks
Prepare the Workforce—Create policies for deciding who returns, shift/schedule management and employee communications
Control Access—Enforce protocols for safety and health checks, building reception, shipping/receiving, elevators and visitor policies
Create a Social Distancing Plan—Follow guidelines for decreasing density, schedule management and office traffic patterns
Reduce Touch Points and Increase Cleaning—Implement open doors, clean-desk policy, food plans and regular cleaning of common areas
Communicate for Confidence—Recognize the fear employees may feel in returning to the workplace and work with them to alleviate their anxiety
Plan early and be flexible
There’s no question there will be a great deal of uncertainty as organizations plan their return-to-work strategies.
“It will happen in phases, it will be very complex and it will look different for every organization,” Bill Knightly, Cushman and Wakefield’s Chief Operating Officer of Global Occupier Services, noted in a recent webinar. “We know progress is unlikely to be linear … We know the rules of the game are likely to change as we’ve seen inconsistent messaging from health authorities and governments around the world.”
That being said, a safety and security planning professional can help alleviate the uncertainty and tailor a fully integrated security plan to meet the specific needs of an organization and its workforce. The key is planning early and often as the situation evolves.
DOES YOUR TORONTO BUSINESS NEED EMERGENCY PLANNING?
FILL OUT OUR QUOTE FORM TO LEARN ABOUT OUR SERVICE OPTIONS
When you haven’t thrown a civic party quite as huge as the NBA Championship parade that crowded downtown Toronto on Monday, you can be forgiven for overlooking a few details. If the Raptors players arrived on stage a few minutes late, for example, it would be excusable. If local streets were a little over-clogged, it wouldn’t be such a big deal.
But maintaining public safety and security is one area where we simply can’t drop the ball. At times on Monday, the city missed worse than Shaq at the free-throw line.
The good news overall is that despite a shooting that sent four people to the hospital, a minor stabbing incident and a few scuffles, the day to celebrate our basketball champions went relatively smoothly. There were no deaths, no rioting and no reported looting—a low bar for a public gathering to be sure, but one that’s unfortunately come to set the mark for the success of any successful North American sports rally.
For someone who was in the heart of the action and had a bird’s eye view as it all played out— stage left at Nathan Phillips Square to be exact—there were still many security lessons to take away from these historic festivities. The unfortunate reality is that the city fell asleep at the wheel when it came to making proactive preparations for our new favourite sports team’s proudest moment.
So, without casting blame, let’s simply make sure to do better next time. Here’s how:
Event planning is key
What became obvious as I stood in the jam-packed square awaiting the team’s arrival was how the city could have benefited from maintaining a standing special events strategy to manage such an occasion. Perhaps it’s because we haven’t had to plan a parade since the Blue Jays won back-to-back World Series in 1992 and 1993, and not since 1967 for the Maple Leafs, but it’s clear that Toronto lacks a contingency plan for mass celebrations that need to be planned on the fly.
Think of it like having an Emergency Preparedness and Disaster Response Plan, but with a celebratory spin. The strategy should take into account not only crowd control considerations from parade route planning to time but also the potential for a seismic crush of people as spectator numbers inevitably exceed expectations. With more than one million Greater Toronto Area residents estimated to have poured into downtown on Monday, it’s extremely difficult to account for every potential security and crowd-management scenario with only a few days to prepare. A standing plan would help alleviate that stress and risk.
Praise the police—now add even more of them, including security personnel
So packed was Nathan Phillips Square that when shots rang out during the player and dignitary speeches, I wasn’t able to see a portion of the crowd fleeing in fear. There were simply too many people and it was impossible to see more than just a dozen metres away, let alone across the sprawling, modernist piazza.
The police did an extraordinary job responding, apprehending the alleged assailants and keeping the crowd calm and under control. In fact, their presence was felt on the surrounding streets and, for the most part, they used common sense in letting fans party, intervening in the festivities only when necessary. But there could have been even more officers in the square, along with hired security guards, to help keep the crowds from pushing and shoving. I arrived in the space at 9 am and it was already jammed to capacity. People were still pushing their way in six hours later as the speeches began, creating a dangerous situation with the crowd literally swaying in unison as they tried to preserve their collective footing. Having officers stationed in greater numbers in the middle of the crowd might have helped mitigate the risk of a potential crowd control catastrophe.
In one instance, for example, I watched paramedics struggle to make space to remove an individual who took ill in the middle of that swaying pack, eventually hopping a fence in the VIP area to gain access to the person. Emergency access was almost non-existent, creating a dangerous situation.
Improve access control
Next time around I would love to see access control for Nathan Phillips Square similar to the system used in Jurassic Park, where party-goers have their bags checked and numbers are limited. There is ample food, water and washrooms to accommodate the throngs of people that pack that space, helping to alleviate the crowd rage that can emerge on a hot, sunny day when people are exhausted, thirsty and hungry.
Doing so would also help avoid people entering Nathan Phillips Square with liquor and drugs—there were ample amounts of both on display—which takes away from the family-friendly atmosphere and sets the stage for trouble. At one point I saw parents with two young girls struggling to get one of their children, who was in tears, out of the crowd. She was trapped and the tired crowd was beginning to become more aggressive as it waited for the Raptors’ arrival. The good news: they eventually managed to pull her out. At that point I thought about a potential escape route myself, should the crowd become even more unruly.
What we are reminded is that you can’t allow hundreds of thousands of people to flood into a relatively confined space with no access control and have more people entering than exiting right up until the very end of the celebration.
Speed it up
By all accounts, much of the parade route lacked any kind of roadside barriers to hold back crowds. This meant that excited onlookers could slow the buses and floats—especially the ones carrying team members—to a slow crawl. Players who were supposed to arrive in Nathan Phillips Square at noon didn’t make it there until 3 o’clock. By that point the crowd was in no mood for further delays.
The takeaway here is that parade planning and security needs to be a city-wide initiative. If managing logistics along a lengthy route is too difficult, it may be best to shorten the length of the parade to avoid potential issues. Nearby access roads were so clogged that emergency services vehicles and buses couldn’t move. The TTC suspended service to several subway stations around the square in an attempt to avoid further overcrowding.
I sincerely hope that we can apply these lessons and better manage crowds at future parades, even if the Raptors’ ongoing success may be largely up to Kawhi Leonard to decide. If he signs for another five years, the party could keep going. His contract status notwithstanding, we should be proud of the team’s accomplishments and hold our heads high.
For the most part, Toronto showed its team spirit with dignity, discipline and still managed to throw an unforgettable party. Now, let’s work to do an even better job after our next championship!
One of the most enduring memories from the vicious van attack near the busy Yonge-Finch intersection that shook Toronto residents last month—not to mention Canadians from across the country—was the scene of bodies strewn across the sidewalk, desperately awaiting medical help.
First responders acted so quickly and with such incredible professionalism that it was clear their work helped limit the carnage to 10 dead and 16 wounded. Without their swift action, who knows how high the death toll could have climbed?
Another image was just as powerful. That was the alleged driver of the van, Alek Minassian, being arrested by an officer who used both discretion and restraint to take the man down without firing a single shot. But watch the footage of the arrest closely and you’ll notice something going on in the background that was as interesting as it was disturbing—a handful of individuals emerged from an office building and stood for a second, stunned, watching the bizarre incident playing out before them.
Now, it would be easy to chastise the individuals for not immediately realizing what was happening—in particular, noticing a police officer who at that point was brandishing his gun—and quickly taking cover. But why would they? Toronto is a remarkably safe city. Situations like these are unprecedented and would leave anyone reasonably grasping for a real-time plan to maintain their own safety. The video shows the bystanders slowly coming to the realization that standing by and watching the events unfold wasn’t the wisest course of action. They soon disappear offscreen.
In my last blog, I underscored the importance of designing a comprehensive emergency preparedness and disaster response plan for your organization or commercial property, and being ready and able at all times to activate it. I want to highlight another important lesson from this incident: that effective security strategies don’t necessarily end at your building’s front door.
In an emergency situation, your security team (which could be composed of in-house staff or personnel from an outsourced firm such as Wincon Security) must spring into action to secure the premises and ensure the safety of everyone inside. That’s a given. But the property’s EPDRP should include a contingency for extending those protocols to the outside of the building, as well. Why? As we saw in the video footage from the van attack, it’s reasonable to assume that a building’s occupants could—unwittingly or not—wander outside your front door and find themselves in the middle of a dangerous situation.
Ideally, after identifying the risks associated with the situation and making a real-time assessment to determine how best to manage it, your security team will alert a building’s occupants of the need to remain calm, follow instructions and seek safety. Let’s assume your building has a PA system—and if not, that’s another major problem that needs to be addressed. If the threat or emergency is occurring off of the premises, it’s then up to security to make an announcement requesting that occupants remain inside until given further notice. If not, then an evacuation might be in order.
Either way, security teams need to be given the mandate to monitor activities across a property, including in the surrounding grounds or neighbourhood, while always staying on top of breaking news and developments to keep a step ahead of the situation. Our team members are trained to do exactly that, with their duty being to secure a complete perimeter, not only the core area that is the focus of their daily patrol duties. Unfortunately, not every security firm takes the same comprehensive approach.
We can be thankful that none of the individuals in that second video (of the alleged attacker’s takedown) were injured in any way, although I’m sure they were at least slightly shaken when they realized the magnitude of the scene playing out in front of them. But with the right planning, training and a proactive, strategic approach to security, their incursion into a live, potential shooting incident, could have been stopped. Let’s hope commercial property owners, managers and security teams take this lesson to heart when the time comes to revise their security plans—then take the time to extend those plans past the threshold of their buildings.
The calm of employees darting to and from work and innocent passersby enjoying a sunny Monday stroll in north Toronto was shattered on April 23rd, when an individual hopped a curb near the intersection of Yonge and Finch and engaged in a murderous rampage, running down and killing 10 people, while injuring 16. A terrified city immediately fell into a state of shock and fear, then mourning as the names of the deceased and injured were eventually released.
The alleged driver of the vehicle, Alek Minassian, was quickly apprehended by police, ending the rampage and restoring new normalcy to the city. While Toronto is one of the safest cities on the planet, we were all reminded of the need to be vigilant and prepared for emergency situations, however unlikely they may be. That last part is important. Only a tiny fraction of one-per cent of us will ever be involved in such a gut-wrenching tragedy.
For that, we can all be thankful.
The challenge is that when disaster strikes or an individual or a group of people become intent on causing harm to others, we must be prepared to react with comprehensive emergency preparedness and disaster response plan (EPDRP). I outlined the importance of having just such a strategy in place on our Emergency Security Page, focusing on the nuts and bolts of designing a customized plan that makes sense for your organization.
But the Toronto van attack targeted pedestrians on a public street. How would an EPDRP help in such a situation? The answer, in this case, is that it wouldn’t. But a variation of that tragedy plays out in workplaces with alarming frequency across North America—particularly in jurisdictions where gun ownership is more widely accepted. Increasingly, vehicles are becoming the weapon of choice for that intent on causing harm thanks to their availability and ease of access. All it takes is for someone to drive a van through a storefront or to run down employees in a busy parking lot—see the murder of a Canadian forces member by way of a car attack in Quebec in 2014—and the ease at which these crimes can be committed becomes apparent.
For commercial property owners and managers, not to mention employers intent on protecting their staff, the EPDRP is a tool to help ensure readiness and to take action when worst-case scenarios play out. The one point I want to re-emphasize from that previous blog in the wake of the Toronto van attack is the need to communicate the plan to employees, and to conduct regular drills to make its deployment simple and reflexive. It’s crucial to work with your security firm or in-house security personnel to develop a plan that addresses potential vulnerabilities across your workplace. The plan should also nod to operational realities such as shift changes or periods of increased vulnerability, as well as logistical concerns relating to the layout of your property or building.
Most importantly, we remind our clients that an effective EPDRP is about people more than anything else, and most notably how they react in a challenging situation. The key is to remind employees, residents (in the case of a condominium property), customers or other stakeholders of the importance of remaining calm in a troubling situation. Then it’s about ushering them to safety and away from danger as soon as possible. At times that could involve a lockdown scenario if an assailant is threatening your property. In the event of an attack similar to the van incident, it could mean remaining inside a building until receiving the all-clear from authorities.
Deploying a plan and keeping stakeholders calm and safe will be the responsibility of your security team. Are they sufficiently trained in these protocols? Are there enough security personnel on duty at any given time to ensure that if an emergency situation occurs, your organization will have the staffing needed to keep the building and everyone inside it safe and secure? Again, these may only be once-in-a-lifetime incidents, but when they happen, you need to be ready.
Almost nothing could have prevented the tragic van attack that shattered so many lives, but if there is any positive lesson we can glean from the incident, it’s that it’s never too late to be prepared for emergency situations—even the most unlikely.
In part two of this blog, I’ll explore another important takeaway from this tragic event.