Tuesday’s lockdown at the Barrie campus of Georgian College ended peacefully after it was determined there was no threat to public safety. While the result was good, the college is using the incident to evaluate its protocols.
At approximately 9 a.m. Tuesday, police responded to “suspicious activity" on the grounds of Barrie’s Georgian campus. A lockdown was initiated as city police investigated any potential threats.
The lockdown was lifted about an hour later, allowing staff and students to return indoors.
Georgian College president and CEO MaryLynn West-Moynes told BarrieToday information about the situation was distributed to many people associated with the campus through the Safe At Georgian app, which provides news on lockdowns, inclement weather, COVID-19, or other issues.
When asked about the efficiency of the app, Roman Calvano, the director of campus safety services, said via email that the college was still “debriefing and looking at how our systems worked and any areas for improvement.”
“We’ve learned some did not receive an alert on their Safe At Georgian app, as they had alerts disabled,” said Calvano. “We’ve already reminded employees and students of this in our message from the president on Tuesday and will continue to remind them to enable alerts.”
Calvano said the system has been upgraded several times in recent years.
“We have redundancies built into our mass-notification systems and we’ve made numerous upgrades over the last several years," said Calvano. "The best test of the effectiveness of our mass-notification system is that everyone affected by this lockdown did exactly what was required of them as the situation unfolded."
Calvano said staff will "continue to look for opportunities to improve our system and plan to re-test it in October during regularly scheduled drills.”
Calvano echoed the words of West-Moynes from Tuesday by saying the lockdown call was appropriate and they were “proud of the swift action taken by the Georgian team and Barrie Police to ensure the safety of our students and employees.”
Many online comments suggested there was a person with a gun on campus grounds.
Barrie police communications coordinator Jennett Mays answered those allegations Wednesday.
“The initial information received was that a suspicious person had been observed, and it was believed they may have been in possession of a weapon,” said Mays.
“Police attended and through their investigation were able to determine that there was never any threat, and the individual was located a short time later. The investigation is now complete, and there was no basis for any criminal charges to be laid," Mays explained.
Mays stressed police “appreciate the public reaching out when they believe there could potentially be a concern for public safety, however we were able to determine there was never any threats in this incident.”
The lockdown at Georgian College was the second lockdown in the city on Tuesday as Barrie police received a call around 7:30 a.m. about a “threat" to Bear Creek Secondary School on Red Oak Drive.
The south-end high school was given the all-clear around 8 a.m., after the threat was deemed to be "unfounded." Students and staff returned to their regular school day.
It remains unclear exactly what the threat involved and the two incidents are not believed to be related.
