When considering security at your church, it comes down to whether you will have unarmed security, armed security, or even a combination of both. Armed or unarmed, most organizations need a formal security/safety team in place.
- Unarmed Security involves organizing volunteers and/or employees and asking them to watch for suspicious behavior, de-escalate non-violent incidents, and alert those gathered at the event to any potential danger. This type of team can be effective in protecting your people while minimizing risk and liability exposure. In many cases, even with limited training, your parking lot team and greeters can serve as an excellent secondary role.
- Armed Security will include either (1) Hiring off-duty law enforcement personnel; (2) Hiring a professional security guard service; or (3) Assembling and maintaining your own security guard service.
Of These Options, Which is Safest?
The overwhelming recommendation is to consider off-duty law enforcement officers or a professional security service. Either of these provides you with security officers who are experienced in handling a weapon, especially in high intense situations. They also understand the reasonable use of force standards and will often assume liability for their actions and thus away from the church.
What’s The Disadvantage of An Armed Volunteer or Employee Security Team?
While this may seem like the simplest armed security option, an armed security team of untrained volunteers is the least desirable option because they often lack the training and experience to handle a weapon in a high-stress situation.
What If We Still Chose to Have an Armed Volunteer Security Team?
Despite the disadvantages, if you still elect to have an armed team of volunteers, we highly suggest that volunteers and employees should only be allowed to serve on an armed security team if there is a significant amount of planning and training. All this places a great deal of responsibility on the church to manage so just another reason to consider more viable options.
- Keep in mind that in most cases, the church’s insurance may not defend or protect your armed volunteer security team. You may be able to purchase a separate policy for this, but it’s not inexpensive to do so.
If We Have an Armed Volunteer Security Team, Does This Impact Our Insurance?
In many cases, yes. Clearly an armed security team is an additional exposure that must be reviewed by your specific insurance carrier. Church insurance policies were not originally intended for this type of exposure so many carriers have stringent guidelines if there are armed volunteers and still some do not desire this exposure at all. For those, they may refuse to quote, or an existing policy could be considered for nonrenewal. It’s critical that you check with your insurance carrier if you have any type of armed security.
With emergency response planning (whether it be violence response, medical emergency, etc.), your preparations and actions have the potential to save lives.
You may also be interest in a previous article entitled: Church Violence
