Years ago, unrest or violence in a house of worship, business, or school was beyond our wildest imagination, but unfortunately, this is no longer the world we are living in, so preparedness and training are the keys to facing potential adversity.
At a time when many of us need the solace, comfort, refuge, and fellowship that comes from spending time with our religious communities, there are grave safety concerns about our safety and security. This is also true for South Florida schools and businesses, as well as those around the nation.
This is why the emergency planning management firm, Clearpath EPM is hosting a first-time, interactive, safety training program for schools, businesses, and houses of worship on Thursday, May 16.
The specialized program is being offered by highly trained safety and emergency planning experts at the Center for Spiritual Living-Fort Lauderdale, 4849 Dixie Highway, in Oakland Park, Florida. Lunch and training materials will be provided at the event. Participants may attend in person or virtually.
“We encourage South Florida schools, businesses, and houses of worship to bring several people to determine what challenges you are facing and find ways to offer safety and security,” explained Clearpath EPM CEO Mike Johnson.
“We are here to help them assess their threats and assets, and for a nominal fee, participants will gain vital and understandable information from this unique training. We put this into terms that the layperson understands. No other organization in the world has our experience and expertise.”
Another great value of the training event, he said, is the excitement that comes from “bringing people together in a collaborative environment and starting to build relationships that will continue after the course is over.”
Johnson, a board member of the Center for Spiritual Living, strongly emphasizes the importance of human connection regarding safety concerns at houses of worship, schools, and other community gathering places. Johnson’s emergency action plans and emergency planning expertise are the keys to these successful training events.
“The best way to avoid human error is to provide training and build competency so that all stakeholders know what to do when faced with any incident or disruption,” Johnson explains. “I call that maintaining the human connection; the awareness of what to do if you see something that is potentially going to be disruptive and what you can do about it.”
Leaders and staff members from schools, businesses, and houses of worship are encouraged to attend this remarkable event to learn about implemented emergency action plans tailored to their specific needs.
We are reminded daily by newspaper headlines and the nightly news that domestic threats and acts of violence against public meeting places in our divided and troubled nation have increased during the past 10 years, both in the U.S. and abroad.
Community, school, business, and church leaders are fearful of not being able to protect themselves and their participants in light of the growing number of fatal shootings and other unrest in the U.S.
Recent incidents have taken place in South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Iowa, Maine, Illinois, Texas, Idaho, Pennsylvania, California, Alabama, and Florida.
Johnson, an involved Broward County community member, has spearheaded numerous highly effective training seminars for schools and businesses. This is the first of its kind of cutting-edge training using Clearpath EPM’s proven safety and training processes.
“There are many different techniques that can be used to mitigate the risk without having armed guards at your gate,” Johnson said. “This is what we are going to cover in the upcoming training. It’s about building a comprehensive program in which you train people on what to look for and how to respond. We want everyone who attends to recognize that there is a lot that they can do to mitigate the risk.”
After 28 years in diplomatic security and law enforcement for the U.S. government, Johnson entered the private sector in 2010 as an executive with a global risk consulting company.
Johnson is a lead trainer and facilitator for several non-profit education organizations and has provided safety, security, and campus resiliency training to hundreds of school and business leaders around the world.
He is a Certified Protection Professional as awarded by the American Society for Industrial Security, (ASIS), a national and international security association made up of 34,000 professionals.
Clearpath EPM’s interactive safety training session is for schools, businesses, and houses of worship leaders, staff, and volunteers.
At the safety training, participants will learn about emergency communication, emergency response protocols, the 4D’s of security, (detect, deter, deny, and delay), and the importance of maintaining situational awareness.
They will also learn how to create a crisis management team, safety response team, and emergency response team for their houses of worship, and build the best practices for team incident response.
In addition, South Florida houses of worship, schools, and area businesses often host large events at their facilities, and they will learn how event planning is a critical part of overall protection and preparedness planning.
Retired U.S. Army Colonel Vince Lindenmeyer uses his strategy experience in the military in his position as partner and chief strategy officer for Clearpath EPM.
“I am looking forward to the May 16 event because it is the opportunity to engage our community in a sound and proven methodology for creating a safety posture for schools, businesses, and houses of worship,” Lindenmeyer said.
“While there is great value being offered throughout the day, it is about building relationships, evaluating resources and assets, and being able to follow up with us,” he explained.
“People want a quick solution, but we want them to analyze their current processes and have a better security posture going forward,” Lindemeyer added. “The key is getting the leaders to say ‘we need this because this is what keeps me up at night.’ We want them to think about their security from A to Z.”
To attend this program in-person or virtually go to, Eventbrite Link:
For additional information go to [email protected] or call 877-376-9133.
Michael Johnson is the CEO of Clearpath EPM and the lead facilitator for this six-hour training event. He recently wrote an insightful article titled “Training And Preparedness: Building A Security Team For Your Religious Community,” and he also shared his expertise on the importance of preparedness for disruptive events in a recent episode of The Chris Voss Show podcast.
