Exercise aims for safe schools

It can happen anywhere – and it will happen again.

On April 20, 1999, 12 students and one teacher were killed at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., in the nation’s deadliest school shooting. Twenty-three others were wounded.

A year earlier, four students and one teacher were killed and 10 others were wounded outside Westside Middle School in Jonesboro, Ark., by two young students. In 2006, a truck driver walked into an Amish schoolhouse in Pennsylvania with a handgun, killing five girls before turning the gun on himself. 

“School shootings are a local, national and global problem,” said Williams Police Chief Jim Saso. “They are happening all over the world.”

Police officers and other emergency responders from Colusa, Yolo, Yuba and Sutter counties trained Wednesday at Williams High School. The goal of the mock shooting scenario is to be prepared should a real school shooting take place.

 “Kids are not necessarily safe when they go to school, so you can never be too prepared,” said Doug Stephan, helicopter pilot for Reach Air Medical Services, Marysville. “Who’s not familiar with Columbine? It’s the sort of thing that can happen anywhere.”

The Williams Police Department sponsored the training exercise, which was provided by the FBI’s San Francisco bureau at no cost.

Shayla Maxey, 17, a senior at Williams High School, portrayed the shooter during one of the session’s live scenarios. The daughter of a Colusa County sheriff’s lieutenant, Maxey was well aware of the possibility that a school shooting could happen at her own school.

“It’s pretty scary to think that it can happen here,” Shayla said. “But it’s good to find out what we should do if it does.”

Danica Sanders, 17, said Wednesday’s training was exciting. She said seeing more than 50 armed police officers scouring the school for the shooter was comforting.

“You don’t want to be afraid of the ones with the guns,” she said. “They are who you run to when you need help.”

Judith Rossi, Williams schools superintendent, was pleased with the training exercise. She said the district has a comprehensive emergency preparedness plan, and each classroom has an easy-to-read flip chart of instructions for students and teachers for any emergency.

“Having received training is an advantage if a shooting was to happen,” Rossi said. “In the culture that we live in, I know it is possible. I hope we never have to face a violent situation, but we have to be as prepared as possible.”

Participants in the training exercise included the Glenn County Sheriff’s Office, Williams and Colusa police departments, Maxwell, Williams, Arbuckle and Colusa fire departments and many out-of-county emergency responders.

Colusa County Sheriff Scott Marshall said the exercise was the largest law enforcement training event of its kind in Colusa County.

Contact Susan Meeker at 458-2121 or smeeker@tcnpress.com.