Ohio Governor Mike DeWine announced on Nov. 22, the creation of a new division within the Ohio Department of Public Safety’s Office of Criminal Justice Services that will focus exclusively on the well-being of Ohio’s first responders.

The new Ohio Office of First Responder Wellness will work to encourage self-care and mental wellness for Ohio’s first responder community including law enforcement, fire, emergency medical services, dispatch, corrections, and Ohio-based military. The office will provide specialized support and training to help emergency-response agencies proactively address post-traumatic stress and other traumas caused by factors that are unique to first-responder careers.

“First responders are truly public servants who put the well-being of others in front of themselves. Unfortunately, the stress of constantly responding to terrible situations like murder scenes, house fires, and tragic accidents can take a toll on the mental, emotional, and physical health of these heroes,” said Governor DeWine. “By creating this new office within the Ohio Department of Public Safety, we’re creating a centralized resource to help our police and fire departments, EMS units, and other first-responder agencies actively place an ongoing focus on wellness with assistance from those who’ve faced some of the same unique on-the-job stress.”

Steven M. Click, who served 36 years with the Ohio State Highway Patrol and oversaw their Member Assistance Team from 2002 to 2018, will serve as the director of the Ohio Office of First Responder Wellness. Click has been active in peer support since 1993 and was deployed twice to New York City after the 9/11 attacks to work with the New York Police Department's peer support team. Most recently, Click served as a liaison between the first responder community and the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services.

“We are thrilled to have Steve lead our work to help first responders deal with the daily stress and pressure of their jobs,” said DPS Director Tom Stickrath. “Maintaining proper mental, physical, and emotional health is critical for them to continue what they do.”

According to Blue H.E.L.P., 940 first responders nationwide have taken their own lives over the past five years, with the majority of those deaths involving law enforcement officers. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, more officers die by suicide than in the line of duty, and compared to the general population, law enforcement officers report much higher rates of depression, PTSD, burnout, and other anxiety-related mental health conditions. Research also shows that stress from a career in law enforcement causes higher rates of secondary trauma such as heart diseases, divorce, alcoholism, and other psychological illnesses.

“I am excited to lead the new Ohio Office of First Responder Wellness, which will serve as a resource for all of Ohio’s first responders,” said Click. “My goal as director is to help bridge the gap between first responders, their local agencies, and a variety of wellness resources.”

The Ohio Office of First Responder Wellness will partner with local and state mental health agencies, including the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services, to offer continuing, comprehensive resources to first-responder entities across the state.

First responder wellness is a priority of Governor DeWine as part of a broader statewide initiative that comprehensively considers the impact of critical incident trauma, chronic exposure to traumatic events, and chronic exposure to organizational stress. In May, the Ohio Collaborative Community-Police Advisory Board established a new statewide minimum standard for officer wellness, focusing on the physical and mental wellness of law enforcement agency personnel. The Ohio Office of First Responder Wellness will also work to offer wellness training for law enforcement next year to meet the Ohio Peace Officer Training Commission’s requirement that all peace officers in the state receive officer personal wellness training in 2022.

“We are constantly evaluating, improving, and enhancing the overall customer experience by providing our customers with as many innovative options as possible that better meet their diverse needs,” said Ohio BMV Registrar Charles Norman.

The service is unavailable to customers who need to make changes to their name, address, or other identifiers on their license. In this instance, customers must visit a Deputy Registrar License Agency. Only one reprint is available between the initial issuance and renewal of an Ohio credential or between renewals of an Ohio credential.

If customers need to visit their local BMV, they can take advantage of “Get In Line, Online”, another of BMV’s time-saving customer service innovations. “Get In Line, Online” is a virtual queuing system that allows customers to check into the deputy registrar location online and advance in line without physically waiting in the office.

This announcement is another part of InnovateOhio’s mission to look at every state service with a focus on the customer’s experience. In addition to this project, InnovateOhio has worked with the Ohio BMV on “Get In Line, Online” and the launch of a vastly improved, more user-friendly BMV website. The redesign allows Ohio customers to have a faster, easier, and more streamlined experience when they are using this resource.

“We felt it was important to be accredited to make sure the way we ran our Academy, and our policies and procedures, were in line with best practices,” said Lieutenant Colonel Chuck A .Jones.

On July 16, 2021, CALEA did say just that about the Patrol’s Training Academy. At the Commission hearing before CALEA, at which time the final determination was made regarding accreditation, the Patrol became only the fifth state highway patrol/state police that has an accredited academy in the country.

For the Division, Academy staff, and the citizens of Ohio, this national accreditation reinforces that the Patrol has one of the best training academies in the country and is conducting law enforcement training at an elite level.

For Highway Patrol or Basic Police cadets, CALEA accreditation lends credibility to the training. For troopers, to know the Academy and the training being provided is nationally accredited and meets all the standards, also adds to the credibility of their position when they are testifying in court or appearing as a subject-matter expert in an official law enforcement capacity.

“Having the backing of CALEA to reinforce the quality of training provided at the Patrol’s Training Academy, and also to maintain those best practices and standards, it definitely helps the operation and administration of the Academy training staff,” Caroline J. Jarka, Patrol Accreditation Manager, said.

At the time of this writing, there were only 42 other law enforcement academies across the United States with CALEA-accreditation status. The Ohio Peace Officers Training Academy is the only other CALEA-accredited academy in Ohio. The Patrol has long been accredited as an agency by CALEA, having even attained Accreditation with Excellence status.

CALEA’s Public Safety Training Academy Accreditation Program, “is designed to provide administrative and operational support to contemporary organizations with the responsibility of training public safety officials. The program focuses on basic as well as advanced curriculums, with the emphasis on sound instructional techniques, facilities management, student safety, records integrity, and a host of other issues that promote the professional delivery of training within the public safety industry.”

The path to the Academy’s accreditation was a five-year journey that started with Colonel Paul A. Pride.

Beginning in 2016, the Patrol placed an added focus on law enforcement training. Jarka noted the Patrol Training Academy is uniquely situated because it is one of the only state law enforcement academies in the country that trains its own personnel as well as outside law enforcement agencies.

In 2017, initial strategy meetings for CALEA accreditation of the Academy began. The Division enrolled in the CALEA process in 2019, looking to get outside reinforcement of the quality of training provided at the Academy.

Jarka led a team that included Lieutenant Colonel Chuck A . Jones (who began serving as a Captain at the Academy shortly after the process began), Captain Steven R. Rine and other sworn and professional staff who were subject-matter experts at the Academy.

“We felt it was important to be accredited to make sure the way we ran our Academy, and our policies and procedures, were in line with best practices,” Jones said. “There were a lot of meetings that took place to make sure we met all the standards. A lot of work was done by Carrie (Caroline) Jarka and the Academy staff to make sure that the way we were running the Academy, and operating within policy and procedures, was good standard practice.”

They worked through a process of meeting 159 standards that constitute the CALEA Public Safety Training Academy Accreditation Program, which are completely separate standards to those required for the law enforcement agency accreditation through CALEA. For each standard, staff had to assess whether the Patrol’s Academy already met the standard, and if not, how the Patrol would come into compliance.

Jones believes a significant positive change from the Academy accreditation process is what he calls "accountability through documentation."

Overall, accountability for the training provided by the staff has increased through various documentation processes put in place. Staff are also now held accountable to much greater extent for their decisions, which are documented as the training is occurring.

“It really made us look at how we were documenting things. We had a lot of good processes, but maybe the final piece that was missing in some of those areas was the documentation piece – to be able to show this is what we did, and this is how and why we did it,” Jones said.

Specific standards pertaining to a requirement for the reviewing of lesson plans, or standards requiring written directives to address high-risk training, needed to be assessed for compliance. If those items were not already in place, staff started drafting Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) specific to Academy operations in accordance with the specific standards.

Once the SOPs were drafted, the next phase involved gathering specific documentation proofs that showed the standards and written directives were being met. Compiled documentation included emails, forms and lesson plans.

“What I told the Academy staff about this process was there is some stuff that is going to change, but a lot of it is reinforcing and writing down the good stuff that you are already doing,” Jarka said. “A lot of the things were already in place when the process began, but through the accreditation process now those things are written down and codified to carry on from captain to captain, or sergeant to sergeant. It was institutionalized knowledge that was passed down, but now it’s actually codified and made policy.”

Next came an off-site file review, during which time a CALEA inspector logged into the Academy network and reviewed all the documentation, SOPs and proofs. Recommendations were provided by the inspector, which were used for modifications and updates by Academy staff.

That was followed by a “virtual” on-site assessment (due to COVID protocols). This involved a series of interviews and virtual tours so the assessor could see the Academy, meet the staff and ask questions regarding compliance with the standards.

The final Commission hearing and accreditation determination was made during the July 16, 2021, hearing.

“When you are forced to go through and look at all the policies and standard operating procedures, there are things along the way that you know but you kind of forget the little nuances, so it really made us all focus on the fine details of what we do as Academy staff members,” Jones said. “It made us take that deep dive into the operating procedures and see what was working and what wasn’t. The biggest takeaway was forcing us to go back and reflect on the total operation of the Academy and the way were running things.”

There are multiple benefits of having gone through the CALEA process for both the organization, cadets and Academy staff.

Jones noted the accreditation process helped ensure all training is in line with good practices and the Division is not putting itself in a bad liability situation.

For example, officer safety is a crucial component of Academy training. Through this process, a close examination occurred of how high-intensity tactical training, or HITT training, is conducted. That is a training area meticulously covered by policy and procedure with respect to use of force and response to resistance. Though accreditation, an evolution has occurred regarding how training meets specific related standards and how training to those individual standards is now documented. New procedural and safety protocols for HITT training are now in place that not only better protect the cadets, but also the instructors.

Organizationally, a prime benefit is risk mitigation and risk management. It forced command staff to think through some of the highest risk elements in law enforcement, and how best to prioritize training toward those topics. Through the accreditation process, the Patrol now has concrete procedures written down for how training is conducted on driving, defensive tactics, firearms and response to an active shooter. Previously there were guiding principles in place, but now specific training plans are written down associated with each topic.

In terms of Academy staff benefits, instructor evaluations are a requirement going forward that came out of this process, which will help with the development of the instructors as employees along with the quality of instruction they provide.

Other benefits include better checks and balances on training lesson plans and implementation of the training, and better lines of communication between different areas of the Academy.

“The history of our Academy is storied and we never want to erode that away. Quite honestly, that’s why the chiefs and sheriffs are sending their Basic officers to us is because of that professionalism and the way we run our Academy,” Jones said. “This was another way to make sure we are performing at the highest level possible and maintaining our professionalism as an organization, particularly at the Academy in the way we are training cadets and Basic police officers.”

The Wolstein Center at Cleveland State University was Ohio’s first COVID-19 mass vaccination site. The Ohio Emergency Management Agency was instrumental in coordinating the development and operations of the federally supported community vaccination center, which was conveniently located in downtown Cleveland.

The Wolstein Center operated as a vaccination site from March 16 to June 7, 2021. In the 12 weeks of operation, around 260,000 vaccines were administered – at times averaging more than 6,000 appointments per day.

In corroboration with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Ohio National Guard, Ohio Department of Health, and Northeast Ohio hospital systems, the Wolstein Center’s Community Vaccination Center (CVC) established a new model for mass vaccination that improved efficiency and distribution. The concept, as implemented, was developed by an Ohio EMA Planning supervisor.

Ohio Department of Public Safety’s State Medical Director Dr. Carol Cunningham as a part of the National Association of State EMS Officials (NASEMSO), and other organizations, updated the NASEMSO National Model EMS Clinical Guidelines which will incorporate the recently published evidence-based guidelines for prehospital pain management. The guidelines address topics such as which medications are safest and most effective for pain management for patients of all ages.

The third edition of the guidelines document is funded by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) and is expected to be published in February of 2022.The first edition and second edition, in which Dr. Cunningham also contributed, was published in 2014 and 2017 respectively.

“The guidelines are designed to be patient-centric and, as such, are focused on improving patient outcomes rather than a specific scope of practice, EMS system design, resource availability, or budgetary limitations,” said Cunningham, co-principal investigator for the current revision process of the model clinical guidelines.

Dr. Cunningham and her colleagues are also working on accompanying education materials and performance measures that will help EMS organizations implement the guideline and track whether they are providing patients with evidence-based care.

To learn more, please click the following link: EMS Update - Advancing Evidence-Based, People-Centered EMS Care