A specialized police unit in Chatham-Kent is evolving to better meet the needs of modern policing challenges in the community.
According to a recent police board report, the Chatham-Kent Police Service Critical Incident Response Team (CIRT), which is comprised of 14 officers, has been rebranded as the Emergency Response Team (ERT) following a pilot project in 2024.
As part of the pilot project, CIRT members focused on intensive training with specialized equipment to test their operational readiness and capabilities.
Several officers on the team completed training courses last year to further enhance the team’s abilities in emergencies. This training included courses in mechanical breaching and chemical munitions, along with a tactical medic course, a search manager course, and a tactical negotiator course.
The report stated that the transition from a “containment team” to a “tactical team” was needed to address the growing demand for emergency responses in policing due to weapons-related incidents, assaults, active threat situations, natural disasters, and mental health crises.
In 2024, the Critical Incident Response Team was utilized 249 times, which included executing 14 high-risk warrants, two missing person incidents, two mental health crisis incidents and two weapons-related incidents.