Involved in event management for a venue? You understand the threat of targeted violence firsthand. What emergency management best practices should you deploy to prepare for potential incidents?
In the following article, we delve into CISA’s recent venue security considerations guide.
Venue Guide for Security Considerations
Why CISA?
Well, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) serves as the sector risk management agency for commercial facilities. In that capacity, the agency partners with venue operators to prepare for potential incidents.
One of CISA’s most recent initiatives has been the development of the Venue Guide for Security Considerations.
Developed in tandem with industry experts and security professionals, the Guide serves as a broad catalog of actions to support safe, secure, day-to-day operations and event and emergency management planning and execution.
What the Guide accomplishes
More specifically, the Guide aims to help venue operators enhance safety, protect assets, and create secure environments through effective security and emergency measures and best practices.
What else does the Guide do?
Provides guidance for venues
Such as evaluating security measures, complexity levels, costs, options, and threats mitigated by these measures. By balancing these factors, venues can create a secure environment for operators and guests.
Recommends broadly applicable considerations for evaluating security practices
Such as assessing measures and improving physical security compliance to ensure staff and visitor safety.
Offers actionable guidance
For prioritizing the most effective security practices and proactively reducing the risk of major threats.
Provides venue operators with a tailored menu of security options
Allowing them to select the most suitable and effective measures for their venue’s budget, size, location, and risk factors.
Potential threats to events
Without reading the Guide, venue operators already know to conduct a thorough risk assessment to properly identify and mitigate potential threats. However, the Guide does a great job of laying out the potential threats venue operators are most likely to face. Those threats include:
- Shooter
- Vehicle incident
- Improvised explosive device (IED)
- Vehicle-borne IED (VBIED)
- Crowd control
- Chem/Bio WMD
- Hostile patrons
- Civil disturbance
- Unmanned aircraft systems
- Loss of services/disruption
- Industrial incident
- Natural disaster/extreme
- Weather [event]
- Event cancellation
- Theft/vandalism
Best-practice measures for venue operators
From there, best-practice measures, as the Guide points out, are likely to run the gamut from low to high complexity.
At the one end, low-complexity measures are those that are easy to implement using readily available resources. They might include:
- Training existing staff members
- Upgrading basic systems
- Using easily accessible and affordable equipment
At the other end of the spectrum, high-complexity security measures require resources that are
not readily available. Relevant measures include:
- Hiring specialized security personnel or consultants
- Acquiring advanced security systems or equipment exceeding the current budget
- Extensive training
- Long-term construction projects
Emergency management measures for venue operators
Now, what are some emergency-management measures venue operators should deploy? The Guide recommends the following:
- Mark evacuation routes/standoff distance points clearly
- Test emergency notification systems
- Coordinate with first responders to designate medical triage/EMS staging area in the event of an incident
Of course, those measures only scratch the surface of what venue operators should do to mitigate threats to their events. For more all-hazards planning strategies, download our All-Hazards Planning Guide to Effective Major Event Management.
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