Podcasts & Blogs

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there has been an uptick in violent incidents occurring in the work environment, from 65% to 73%. Therefore, training must be comprehensive, encompassing all areas of daily operations and should translate into an opportunity for organizations, by turning a “squeamish” subject into a benefit with a possible return on investment (ROI).

In preparing for potential disasters, it is important to collaborate with a team or committee that reviews the potential for catastrophic events and consideration for mitigation needs. Selecting the members of the team is crucial. Each member should be representative of all areas of the organization, including purchasing (contracts and materials), food services, human services, education, planning, finance, payroll, risk & safety and particularly facilities maintenance staff.

So, what can schools do to ensure their hiring process screens out applicants trying to hide past discretions? Let us look past background checks and evaluate other critical screening components.

Surgeries, spinal interventions, opioids, stimulators, or intrathecal pumps are not always the best approaches. They may cause physical deterioration and drastically increase our expenses. Here are some suggested alternatives:

The good news is that a back-up communications system and process can save the day, even in the most challenging scenarios, to meet both short-range needs—from within your facility to city-wide—to long-range needs —for regional and national reach.

The water crisis in Flint, Mich., is not new. Water quality in the city has been an issue for years, affecting many people – residents, companies who use the water supply and elected leadership and environmental health regulators at local, state and federal levels trying to come to grips with the problem. The story has slowly spiraled out from being local to regional to national news.

No amount of beefing up security can stop kids’ prejudices, emotional acting out and peer-to-peer mistreatments from getting through the front doors.

While not all in law enforcement have embraced body cameras, let me outline the case for them. Cameras are already everywhere. We are recorded entering parking lots, businesses, apartment buildings and even walking down the street.

A safety committee is a group of people within your organization that come together on a scheduled basis to talk about your entity’s risks, risk treatments, assessments, threats and opportunities. They are the folks that are critical to the success of your public entity’s mission and might include members from each of your departments – finance, engineering, utilities, legal, code enforcement, building and zoning, public works, fire, police, human resources, members of your legislative body and even your labor unions!