Self Storage Association Members are Pro-active with Homeland Security & Local Police to Thwart Terrorism
ALEXANDRIA, Va.-(Business Wire)-September 25, 2009 - The Self Storage Association (SSA), in coordination with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) this week formally alerted its 6,000 member-companies, its affiliated state associations – and their thousands of member- companies – and thousands of individual facility managers of the potential for illegal use of self storage units in connection with terrorism. These alerts were disseminated nationally and posted on the SSA member-only web site in the wake of recent arrests in Colorado and New York.
Investigators believe that alleged terrorists could store illegal materials or assemble them in self storage rental units as part of a domestic terrorism plot. Authorities have requested that anyone suspecting terrorist, suspicious or illegal activity contact the Joint Terrorism Task Force in their area, the FBI, and/or local law enforcement authorities immediately.
The SSA has participated on the DHS Commercial Facilities Subsector Coordinating Council of the Infrastructure Protection Task Force, along with leaders from other real estate and commercial facility industries that may also be potential terrorism targets or otherwise be in a position to recognize and thwart suspicious activity.
Since September 11, 2001 and the creation of the DHS, the SSA has cooperated regularly and fully with federal, state and local government officials, and via its network of 25 state and regional self storage associations to ensure that its collective membership is educated and informed as to the threat of terrorism and ways to detect suspicious activity in and around self storage facilities.
“I am quite proud of the self storage industry’s level of sincere interest and proactive participation in preventing the use of any SSA member-owned and operated self storage unit for illegal or terrorist activity,” said Michael T. Scanlon, Jr., president and chief executive officer of the Self Storage Association. “We have put in place a series of security-oriented programs and publications to directly inform our membership and to educate and train our front-counter facility managers to recognize suspicious behavior and the necessary steps to immediately report such activity to the proper authorities. Our members are actively cooperating and working with everyone from the Department of Homeland Security, the Joint Terrorism Task Force participants across the nation, to the FBI and local police forces – even going so far as offering the use of our self storage facilities for the ongoing training of bomb-sniffing and drug-sniffing police dogs to preemptively detect those who might try to use rented storage space for nefarious illegal or terrorist activity,” Scanlon added.
The SSA introduced and maintained a “Spotlight on Security” education and information program for the last five years; and, as recently as last year, SSA published a new book entitled “Security for the Self Storage Industry.” This program and publication, as well as other materials, pamphlets and ongoing facility manager training sessions all emphasize the importance of being pro-active and preventing the illegal use of self storage units for illegal or terrorist activity.
About the Self Storage Association
Founded in 1975, the Self Storage Association (SSA) is the national not-for-profit trade group and registered lobbying organization serving the $20 billion (annual revenues) self storage industry including owner-operators, facility managers and vendors in the self storage industry. The SSA represents some 3,000 direct member companies and another 3,000 indirect member firms [via twenty-five (25) affiliated state and regional associations] that own and operate a total of some 22,000 facilities in the US, Canada and 29 other nations. SSA is also affiliated with self storage organizations in Asia, Australia, Europe, Latin & South America. SSA direct members range from individual facility owner-operators to multiple-facility operations, to the industry’s largest publicly traded Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs).
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