State Homeland Security officials urge better information sharing, expand behavioral threat teams after school attacks

Leaders from the Georgia Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency (GEMA) and the Department of Education told a joint meeting of the Senate and House Education committees that school safety requires improved statewide information sharing and wider adoption of behavioral threat assessment teams to prevent violent incidents.

GEMA deputy director Linda Kriblay said the agency is pushing two priorities: improving information sharing among schools and law enforcement, and expanding behavioral threat assessment and management (BTAM) programs. "We are not collecting the dots, so we can't expect our superintendents and sheriffs to connect the dots," Kriblay said, arguing that after‑action reviews of past attacks show signs typically appear before violence occurs.

The remarks came as GEMA officials reported a sharp increase in validated school safety threats: 214 in the first quarter of the 2024–25 academic year, compared with 20 in the same period the previous year. Kriblay emphasized that…