[V]ermont will receive a little more than $400,000 in federal grants to put toward a new school safety tip line and active shooter trainings.
The Vermont State Police will receive $173,000 from the U.S. Department of Justice to create a tip line for students, teachers, school staff and community members to report school violence threats anonymously online or by phone. Vermont Emergency Management, meanwhile, will get $230,000 to expand the SurviVermont program.
SurviVermont is a public information initiative out of the St. Albans area aimed at delivering the national “See Something, Say Something”,”Run, Hide, Fight” and “Stop the Bleed” campaigns locally.
In active shooter situations, “regular folks on the street are going to be the first responders,” said Emergency Management Director Erica Bornemann. SurviVermont is aimed at giving tools to use “before help arrives.”
The department applied for the grants after an incident at Fair Haven Union High last year, when a former student, Jack Sawyer, was arrested and accused of planning a mass shooting at the school. The case sparked a change to the state’s gun laws and millions in additional spending on school safety infrastructure.
The latest grant “just adds on to the resources that are available to address school safety realistically and holistically,” Bornemann said.
Correction: A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that Fair Haven Union High was in Poultney. It’s in Fair Haven.