The communities of Derry

The communities of Derry, Salem, Londonderry, Windham, Hudson, Pelham, Raymond, Atkinson and Litchfield have pooled law enforcement resources for the purposes of forming a Regional Special Operations Unit.

The unit is incorporated with the Secretary of State’s office, has its own taxpayer ID assigned by the I.R.S. and does business as the Southern New Hampshire Special Operations Unit at 1 Municipal Drive, Derry NH.

The unit is managed and run by a Board of Directors, which encompasses all of the member agencies Chiefs of Police. Presently, Chief Edward B. Garone, Chief of the Derry Police department serves as the council’s president.

The communities involved have signed an Interagency Mutual Aid Agreement and have formulated a comprehensive set of Standard Operating Procedures that regulate and govern the unit.

Each agency contributes manpower as follows:

Derry Police Department	9 – Tactical Officers	1 – Negotiator
Londonderry Police Department	8 – Tactical Officers	0 – Negotiators
Salem Police Department	6 – Tactical Officers	3– Negotiators
Hudson Police Department	6 – Tactical Officers	2 – Negotiators
Windham Police Department	2 – Tactical Officers	0 – Negotiator
Litchfield Police Department	1 – Tactical Officer	0 – Negotiator
Pelham Police Department	2 – Tactical Officers	0 – Negotiator
Raymond Police Department	3 – Tactical Officers	0 – Negotiator
Atkinson Police Department	1 – Tactical Officer	0 – Negotiator

As you can see from those numbers each community contributes significant resources to the effort with an allotted strength of 38 tactical officers and 7 negotiators.

Cumulatively, the unit is responsible for providing specialized police response to the nine member communities representing a population of 150,000 residents (2000 U.S. census data), which is approximately 12% of the states entire population.

An example of specialized police response would be to serve a high risk search warrant, or serving a high risk arrest warrant where there is likelihood that the person(s) sought may be armed. The bulk of our work has been the service of drug search/arrest warrants. The unit also responds to situations that rapidly exceed the normal capabilities of the member communities’ law enforcement resources such as barricaded gunmen/hostage taking incidents among others.

The unit has been training to respond to criminal terrorists incidents and is working closely with the Southeastern New Hampshire Hazardous Materials Mutual Aid District, HAZMAT team in furtherance of that goal. Joint training operations are conducted on a regular basis between the units to promote tactical interoperability.

On 08-07-2003 the Board of Directors voted to amend the unit Standard Operating Procedures to allow the member communities Fire Departments to contribute Firefighter/Paramedics to the unit for the specific purpose of formulating a Tactical Medical component. The amendment also allows for the appointment to the unit of Emergency Room physicians from the Parkland Medical Center.

Presently, three Physicians serve in the unit. The Towns of Derry, Salem, Pelham, Lomdonderry and Windham supply tactical firefighter/paramedics to the unit as follows:

Derry Fire	3 Paramedics
Salem Fire	1 Paramedic
Windham Fire	1 Paramedic
Londonderry Fire	1 Paramedic
Pelham Fire	2 Paramedics
Parkland Medical Center	3 Emergency Physicians

This partnership with the local hospital and Fire Departments augments our available man power. The total number of personnel committed to the unit now stands at:

38 Tactical Officers

7 Negotiators

3 Medical Doctors

8 Firefighter/Paramedics

These commitments provide a robust response capability of 56 highly trained personnel that can work in a multi discipline environment involving law enforcement response with the need for emergency medical operations.

It is expected that this partnership between the Law Enforcement entities of the SNHSOU, the Fire Departments and HAZMAT district will lead to the need for more integrated training, Future equipment considerations and will provide a much smoother response with enhanced capabilities for all of the agencies involved.