NAHANT — The Board of Selectmen and Town Administrator Tony Barletta presented local business owner Wendy Kessler with a citation Wednesday night for her new emergency-preparedness training company, Focus on Safety.
The Greater Lynn Chamber of Commerce held a ribbon-cutting ceremony in Lynn’s Red Rock Park last week to recognize Focus on Safety’s opening.
Kessler’s business offers a number of training programs, ranging from anger management classes to active-shooter survival skills. Her training programs include the National Rifle Association’s Refuse To Be A Victim program, which teaches civilians methods to avoid dangerous situations and prevent criminal confrontations, and her ALIVE training courses, which teach survival skills in an active-shooter scenario.
Focus on Safety’s active-shooter response training, Kessler said, serves schools and workplaces through in-class teaching and hands-on training.
“I hope to have an opportunity to work with the Town of Nahant, as well as other individuals and businesses, to give you some information that, in this world, unfortunately is needed,” Kessler said. “We want to teach you the survival mindset and the security mindset of how you would act if something like this happened.”
Board of Selectmen Chairman Mark Cullinan congratulated Kessler on her new business, adding that he thought her crime-prevention classes could help the Council on Aging protect seniors, and that her active-shooter survival classes might be of interest to the Johnson School.
Vice Chairman Joshua Antrim added that Kessler’s shooter response classes could benefit the town — noting that the need for active-shooter preparedness programs speaks to a bleak reality in the U.S.
“It’s a sad situation that we have in this country, and we’re not facing up to it,” Antrim said. “There’s a mass shooting in the U.S. almost twice a week. Last weekend, there were two shootings at Revere Beach. You think you’re going to the beach to spend time with family, and then there’s a shooting. It’s crazy.”
Barletta echoed Antrim and Cullinan’s remarks, adding that he thought Kessler’s Refuse To Be A Victim classes would be of benefit to the town’s senior population — especially as new technologies make elder scams more difficult to recognize.
“With AI and ChatGPT and all these new technologies that are out there, teaching people what to be aware of to make sure that they’re not being scammed is another skill set that’s really important to share,” Barletta said.
