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Going back to the comment on SWAT teams, my personal experience has been that unless an agency has a full time SWAT team (and only one agency in my County does), it will take upwards of 30 minutes to an hour to get the guys together, gearded up, briefed and to the scene. Sure, when they get there, they TKOB but in the meantime people are getting killed. Most teams are part time and the officers assigned to them have other duties. So, when called out they have to respond from where ever they are.
The "active shooter" concept that started after Columbine recognized the fact that waiting for SWAT to arrive in active shooter situations gets people killed. Give the line officers the means to end a bad situation quickly if the situation arises.
Most of us agree that the solution is providing rifle caliber carbines and proper training to street officers. Some administrators on the other hand, are slow to act on this. It took me close to 8 years to get the administration of my agency to authorize them. They (the PD) still will not provide them but does authorize officers to carry personally owned rifles which is better then nothing.
In my 18+ years as an LEO, I've learned that most agency adminstrators are reactive in their outlook no matter how much they may profess to otherwise. I've seen how fast an administration can draft and approve a general order or policy if they see fit and the chief believes it is important (these usually involve something you Will NOT do). It's a different matter when attempting to get gear for the guys and girls and the street.
Someone usually has to get hurt to make a change. It took one of our officers getting killed to begin correcting serious radio problems our patrol officers had been compaining about for years and to get our K-9 unit fully manned.
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