Here’s What Belleville Cops Learned In Active Threat Drill

BELLEVILLE, NJ — It was around 10:30 a.m. when gunshots echoed through the hallways of the Belleville municipal building. But police weren’t worried. They knew it was coming, after all.

A police training exercise in Belleville took place at town hall on Nov. 26, giving local officers the chance to sharpen their skills in case of an active shooter scenario on the premises.

According to Nutley town officials, here’s what took place during the drill:

“A township employee portraying a would-be masked gunman moved about on the main floor, yelling and wielding a faux gun – no real rounds were used in the exercise. Other employees posing as injured victims were scattered in various locations inside the building. While municipal employees practiced safe evacuation and shelter-in-place procedures, township police and fire personnel as well as the Community Emergency Response Team used the drill to help streamline effective responses to emergency situations. Police officers went room to room, checking for gunmen and assessing ‘injured’ municipal employees.”

The exercise was called off at about noon and Town Hall was re-opened soon afterwards. There was no interruption to police, fire or EMT emergency services during the exercises, officials said.

The exercise was organized not only out of “an abundance of caution” in the event of an active shooter situation, but also at the behest of the township’s insurance carrier, officials added.

Members of Essex County Sheriff’s Department, the New Jersey State Police and Clara Maass Medical Center also participated in the Nov. 26 training drill, which was coordinated by Deputy Fire Chief Martin Lutz and Police Captain Nick Breiner.

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The drill didn’t go without its problems according to Mayor Michael Melham, who said that plans are in motion to make immediate corrections based on what they learned.

For example, the first fire alarm emergency responders pulled didn’t engage, and the second one fell apart – although it worked in the end.

In addition, some of the radios didn’t work properly, so fire department personnel weren’t able to hear the all-clear call, Melham said.

Melham said township officials will have to create a standardized set of floor designations inside the municipal building to avoid confusion. People who enter Town Hall through the main entrance may not realize they are actually entering at the second floor.

“So when we were upstairs on what would be the third floor, I heard the radio call out, ‘Shooter on the first floor,’” said Melham, who was an official ‘observer,’ meaning he was invisible to active participants.

“We went down one level because we’re accustomed to the main level being the first floor,” the mayor recalled. “We actually had to go down to another level, to the basement.”

Melham said there were several positive takeaways from the event, including the fact that municipal employees remained calm and remembered their training when a fire alarm was pulled.

“That was a little curveball that we threw into the exercise,” Melham said. “They’re trained to stay in place during an active shooter situation, even though the fire alarm instructs people to evacuate the building. Some shooters have used the fire alarm activation as a way to get people to come out into the open.”

“At the end of the day, this was meant to educate and learn,” Belleville Police Chief Mark Minichini said. “We are quite pleased with how it went. This is the first time that I know of that a municipality this size has staged this exercise. Considering that, I think things went very well.”

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