Church Greeters and Ushers in a Safety Capacity

Hi there, Dave here with the 1st part in a series on supplemental security, or what your greeters can do to help your safety team be more effective. It may be way out of bounds to use a greeter in this manner, but I believe that they should be included in your Emergency Operations Plan, simply because they are the first line of defense for your church. If your greeters or ushers are like most, they have little or no training in emergency operations or security activities. They may even be senior aged or have a disability.

Maybe they think that smiling and shaking hands is the extent of what they would be called on to do in their greeter capacity. Fortunately, this is true. That will continue to be the primary responsibility of greeters and ushers. Thankfully. Churches need friendly faces shaking hands at the front door.

The thing is, greeters and ushers share a bit of the responsibility in keeping the congregation safe and secure. As a matter of fact, anyone in any type of leadership share that duty. They should not be called on to make security or safety decisions. They are not a guard. They’re not the police. They are not responsible for stopping or even mitigating an emergency. They should, however, be constantly on watch and continuously observe the people entering the church and the environment around them, assess what is going on around them, and react accordingly. Simply, that reaction should be to inform a member of the safety committee, and at that point follow the directions they receive.

Greeters and ushers are challenged beyond the norm, in that they need to balance the roles of greeter and guardian. We have seen some that are so intense in their approach that they are off-putting. They seem on edge and tense all the time. While others are unconcerned and rarely aware of what is going on around them. There must be some sort of balance between these two extremes, and this is the challenge.

Part 2 coming soon…