Loss Control Helps Keep City Staff and Property Safe

In the world of insurance and risk management, loss control is exactly what it sounds like — efforts made to make losses of property or life, as well as injuries, as small as possible. Loss control helps keep people safe, and helps to stop potential increases in the cost of insurance.

The Municipal Association’s Risk Management Services, which is the home of two self-funded insurance programs — the SC Municipal Insurance Trust and the SC Municipal Insurance and Risk Financing Fund — has a loss control division focusing entirely on ways to keep the people and the properties that serve municipalities safe. 

“A good safety and risk management process helps identify, analyze and monitor potential risks and take actions to mitigate the impact of potential losses,” said Heather Ricard, director of Risk Management Services. “The loss control staff exist to help municipalities develop and implement safety programs that will protect property and save lives.” 

Loss control training can take many different forms. SCMIT and SCMIRF members have access to tools, like model fire and law enforcement policies and procedures, on-site technical assistance visits as well as online and print education resources. A safety calendars — one for general risk management and another for high-risk critical tasks for law enforcement — is released each year to members as an additional training tool. These calendars draw attention to risk management actions cities and towns can take every month. Members also have access to LocalGovU, a free online training platform that has 90 classes which focus on municipal risk.

The response to resistance simulator is perhaps the most high profile of the available training opportunities. It places law enforcement officers in situations where they must make split-second decisions about the level of force they should use. This Uptown article explains more about the training. 

Other services are available to all cities and towns. Loss control staff contribute to the Risk Management Services RiskLetter newsletter, which can give city and town officials’ ideas of how to better minimize operational risks. The article topics in the recent Summer 2019 issue, for example, include these: 

• the state mental health benefit for first responders,
• the importance of hiring insured contractors, 
• developing plans for take-home vehicles, and
• the most frequently cited OSHA standards. 

Venyke Harley serves as loss control manager for Risk Management Services. Recently, John Ciesielski joined as loss control consultant, having previously worked for the South Carolina branch of OSHA.