Chester Police Department participates in tactical training

</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[Members of the Chester Police Department participated in some more tactical training last Saturday. This time the training was held on the Chester High School campus. First, the staff attended a Department meeting in one of the classrooms, enjoyed some lunch provided by the Department, and then split up and began their training exercises. The training consisted of tactical response to an active shooter, which was held inside the school. Officers also freshened up on some tactical training related to felony traffic stops outside in the parking lot behind the school. These training exercises are part of the commitment our staff made last fall in our "Chester Safe Schools Program". One of the main components of the program is the tactical training portion. All of the members of the Police Department train several times a year visiting each school in the City of Chester. The goal is for our guys to train together and to train on the grounds they will be asked to respond to in an actual emergency. The program calls for a commitment from the entire staff. For example, Chief Coffey will be attending training specific to supervising and organizing emergency response to "active shooter" or other large-scale emergency response calls.

Chief Coffey feels that both the meetings and training sessions have been very beneficial to his staff. Chief Coffey wishes to extend a special thanks to two Southern Illinois Response Team members Brant Summers of the Nashville Police Department and Rick Mallot of the Okawville Police Department for assisting us on Saturday and offering their expertise on tactical operations in response to an active shooter situation.