County sheriff offices across North Carolina are now offering security training for churches.
Eddie Caldwell of the North Carolina Sheriff's Association said churches began asking for help after the mass shooting at a church in Charleston, S.C. this summer.
"A number of the sheriffs started working on these training classes, and then decided it would be good to have something uniform, and rather than each of the 100 sheriffs having to design their own training, if the association could work with the sheriffs to design a training program that could be used by sheriffs all across the state."
Caldwell says the new statewide curriculum encourages church leadership and staff to consider their church's size, structure and resources before coming up with a safety plan. He says this doesn't necessarily mean churches will begin setting up TSA-style screening.
"Then it's the decision of the leadership of that church as to how far they want to go, but the training is not designed for the Sheriff's personnel to tell the church what they have to do."
The training also advises, ministers, staff and other leaders them on how to prevent, react, and help people recover after an incident.
