The Bakersfield Police Department is seeing a spike in requests for active shooter training presentations.
Last year, the department put on a total of 5 presentations. From January to April of this year, they've scheduled 40.
"The huge increase has been because of the San Bernardino situation," said Carina Ortiz of BPD.
The service is completely free and includes a video outline of different situations as well as potential courses of action, courtesy of BPD officers.
"The reason we do it not so they're scared every day at work," said Officer Ryan McWilliams. "But so they know 'hey, this is gonna be bad and hopefully I don't freeze'."
In addition to the presentation, BPD will also walk around your building and go over exit points and potential hiding places.
They can also set up mock shooting situations, a more hands-on approach to learning.
"We're going to one where they're going to do some sort of training or mock-active shooter scenario, and then we'll watch it and give them options for consideration at the end on how they can do things better," McWilliams said.
If you'd like to schedule one of these presentations for your business or have any questions, you can call BPD at 661-326-3052.
