February 25, 2008
More than 200 representatives from colleges, universities,
government agencies, the military and the private sector attended
the launching of a two day forum on campus safety and emergency
preparedness at the Queen campus. “Urban Hazard Forum IV: Campus
School Safety and Emergency Preparedness” was hosted by the
University in partnership with the United States Department of
Homeland Security, FEMA Region II.
James Pellow,
Ed.D., Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer at
St. John’s, welcomed those gathered and thanked them for their
attendance. Events such as the recent shootings at Northern
Illinois University and the gunman incident at St. John’s last
September underscored the need for such an event, he said. “This
unfortunate new reality of the potential for large scale tragic
events is a threat for all of us,” Pellow said. “Like all of you,
we want to do everything in our power to keep our students, faculty
and employees safe. Our team looks forward to sharing with you over
the next two days to learn from you and hear from our wonderful
speakers.” Stephen Kempf, United States Homeland Security FEMA
Region II Regional Administrator also offered welcoming remarks.
Kempf, who has more than 30 years experience in emergency
management and whose New York City headquartered office oversees
agency operations in New York, New Jersey, Puerto Rico and the U.S.
Virgin Islands, said cooperation among the various industries and
agencies is key to maintaining safety. “As you know, we face
threats from many, many different sectors in the world that we live
in today,” he said. “We’ve pondered for many years how do we
address some of these unique, challenging and problematic
situations that confront us almost on a daily basis. None of us can
do it alone.”
The forum attracted quite a few experts in fields ranging from
psychology to logistics. They included: Dr. Russ Federman, ABPP,
Director of Counseling and Psychological Services at University of
Virginia who offered a presentation on “University Student Health
and Its Relationship to Campus Safety;” Dr. Robert McCreight, who
is retired from the United States Department and an Adjunct
Professor at George Washington University who presented “US
Students Overseas Programs;” Thomas Lawrence, Vice President for
Public Safety at St. John’s University who presented “Benefits of
Partnering with Local Law Enforcement;” Assistant Chief Charles
Kammerdener, Commanding Officer, Special Operations Division for
the New York Police Department who presented “NYPD Response Special
Operations;” FDNY Lt. Anthony Mancuso who presented “Fire Safety in
Schools;” Alex Markowski, Director of Logistics, New York City
Office of Emergency Management who presented “Emergency
Preparedness;” and alumnus Robert J. Sica ’78SVC, Deputy Special
Agent in Charge – New York Field Office with the United States
Secret Service who presented “Threat Assessment in Schools: A Guide
to Managing Threatening Situations and Creating Safe School
Climates.”
Lawrence said St. John’s offered the ideal site for such an
informative and timely conference, especially in view of the
incident last September when a troubled student brought a loaded
rifle onto the Queens campus. “There were lessons we learned that
we wanted to share with other universities and colleges,” he said.
“I hope they take away some ideas to make their universities and
colleges safer.” Gerard McEnerney, Assistant Vice President and
Executive Director of the Staten Island campus is responsible for
emergency management throughout the University and said the subtext
of the conference was “engaging critical partners.” “It’s very
important in emergency management that we deal with our colleagues
from other institutions as well as professional emergency
managers,” he said. “As a number of speakers said, no institution
has all of the answers so we walk away with the best practices and
hopefully they will bring it back to their institutions and apply
it.”
The day ended with a panel discussion where many of the featured
speakers were joined by Robert McGuire, Esq., former NYPD
Commissioner and now a private practice attorney and Thomas
Fargione, Deputy Director for Response, New York State. Attendees
then adjourned to a reception held in Sun Yat Sen. The
conference concludes on February 26.