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Sometimes it's just you and the parking officer; get whatever help you can to make it work. Being on the React team means having the right people and equipment for the job. C-CLeaR is an acronym that stands for Command Post, Containment, Long Rife, and React Team. These simple four words can do wonders to help law enforcement, at any level, begin to gain some measure of control over critical events such as barricades and hostage situations. What these four words do is serve as reminders for actions that should be taken immediately, by responding offcers, when they determine that one of the above two situations exist. Command Post The extra "C" for command post was added to teaching the CLeaR concept after witnessing too many critical events being run without an effective command post in place. Unfortunately, there are far too many in law enforcement with an extremely limited knowledge of what a command post is, what it does, or how it should be organized. Often times, a command post is comprised only of a supervisor standing in close proximity to a radio, thinking he is in command of events, yet only vaguely aware of the people and forces in play all around him. In too many of these cases, events unfold with little to no situational awareness on the part of the decision makers, resulting in haphazard, poorly thought out, or delayed decisions that often lead to unanticipated, undesired or unfavorable outcomes. While an in-depth discussion of command post operations is beyond the scope of this article, some discussion is defnitely merited. A CP (Command Post) is utilized by an incident commander (typically the patrol Sergeant or Lieutenant) to plan, direct, coordinate and control the operations of his forces. In essence, the CP is the central nervous system of a critical incident. That means intelligence, operations, and logistics are all managed and controlled by, or through, the CP and its personnel. That requires that ALL information come into, be tracked, or be relayed from the CP. In order to accomplish that sometimes Herculean task, your CP cannot be staffed by just one man and a radio. Obviously, the CP may begin that way, but when dealing with hostage/barricade situations, it would defnitely behoove the patrol supervisor to begin spooling up as rapidly as possible. If you want to succeed at running an effective CP, grab as many people as possible to help, and then begin delegating. If you try to run the entire show yourself, you will quickly fnd yourself being overwhelmed by events. In the past, I've used parking enforcement offcers, explorers, offcers, detectives or other supervisors to help with the myriad of tasks required at a CP. At the top of that list is organizing the people, equipment and resources you have available. Whether you have a next-generation CP vehicle with all the bells and whistles, or a #2 pencil and a pad of paper, start writing information down where you can visually reference it! A critical requirement for any CP is that its key decision maker (usually the Incident Commander) have and maintain situational awareness. That means a complete understanding of the signifcance and relationships of every facet of the operation. The only way that is possible is to track, collect and display all the vital information pertaining to your event. Containment This is one thing that nearly all law enforcement offcers do fairly well. Given any type of problem, it's second nature for most departments to set up at least an inner, and many times an outer, containment. When it comes to hostage/barricades, you want both. The inner containment is to control and contain the immediate problem. The outer perimeter is to limit who else enters into your area of operations (vehicles, peds, lookie lews, the press, etc.). A few common sense things to remember: Always cover all four sides of the problem, even if there appears to be no way out of one of those sides. None of us should be surprised at the lengths some people will go to avoid capture. Punching a hole through a wall, climbing out onto a roof, or getting into a basement or crawl space may result in the suspect suddenly exiting in an area previously thought "impossible." Better to cover all four sides and be sure. Whether you use a letter or a number system, give the four sides of a building an identifer rather than referring to it by a cardinal direction (i.e., north, south, etc.). Typically, the front side of the build- www.lawandordermag.com 43