GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ) – A second annual conference put on by Northeast Wisconsin Technical College (NWTC) is helping religious leaders from all over the state keep their congregations safe.
The colleges “House of Worship Safety and Security” conference brought in 150 religious leaders last year for its inaugural event and they’re expecting around 200 people for this year’s event, which is on Tuesday and Wednesday.
The goal is to provide them with information that can help better protect their church community.
“I think people just don’t think about that,” says NWTC Public Safety Training Coordinator and conference organizer, Jason Weber.
Unlike other buildings, such as schools or office buildings, churches face a different number of challenges in relation to security.
“By its nature it’s going to be open, it’s going to be accessible,” explains Weber. “And how do you protect that?”
The answer for most buildings would be to simply lock the doors to stay safe, but churches don’t have that luxury.
“Are they going to lock their doors, probably not,” he says. “So we rely on procedures.”
Those procedures are what brings in over a hundred religious leaders to the conference as tips towards organization, communication, and assistance are shared in the two days.
One easy practice that is shared with church officials is to go out of the way to greet everyone that comes through so that individual feels as if they have been accounted for and recognized.
“So that person, that bad guy coming in, they get that message that good gosh I can’t go anywhere, because they see me,” explains Weber.
He adds that churchgoers can help protect themselves every day by simply staying alert.
“Just kind of sitting around and saying, ‘Okay, if something happens I can go this way, I can go that way,’” he says. “It’s just kind of being aware of that.”
He adds that church leaders should communicate points of exit with all parishioners in order to help establish a plan if an emergency situation does arise.
The idea to start the conference followed mass shootings in a number of states, including Texas, South Carolina, and Pittsburgh.
On Monday, there will be a free event to the public where a special film presentation of “Faith Under Fire” will be shown at NWTC starting at 7 p.m.
