The chairman of the Oakland County Board of Commissioners wants an independent review of emergency response after the 2021 Oxford High School shooting, saying Thursday he will propose to the board later this month that third-party reviews of such incidents be made mandatory in the county.
Board Chairman David Woodward (D-Royal Oak) announced he would seek funding for the investigation, citing a report in the Detroit News that raised new questions about law enforcement’s response to the mass shooting that left four students dead and seven others injured. The report revealed concerns from two area fire chiefs that Oakland County Sheriff’s Office crews took too long to call them to the scene.
“I always felt there was an impeccable response (in Oxford) in terms of timing and actions,” Woodward said. “The articles highlighted some very serious concerns from first responders and families that need to be addressed.”
In separate allegations, Oxford Fire Chief Matthew Majestic and Addison Fire Chief Jerry Morawski told The News that they dispatched their own crews when the high school was attacked on Nov. 30, 2021. Their concerns prompted victims’ families to again call for a so-called “after action review,” as has been done in other school shootings across the country.
The News also reported that Republican Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard declined to participate in such a review, as requested by County Manager David Coulter’s office in January.
Woodward said he wants to have all mass shootings independently investigated, including the June 15 mass shooting at a wading pool in Rochester Hills that left nine people injured.
“If it makes sense to improve the way things are done, then that’s why you get them done. It’s not about improving,” Woodward said. “It’s about how we can improve so that – God forbid – if an event like this happens again, we’re better coordinated, better trained and better able to respond to these types of events.”
The county is just beginning to draft its next budget, which takes effect Oct. 1. Woodward said he will work to make sure the money for the review becomes available in upcoming budget negotiations. He also said he wants the state to provide funding for a review in Oxford and anywhere in the state where it is needed.
The investigation, which is normally conducted by an outside agency to gain insight into the actions of the coordinating police agency and its partners in the event of a mass shooting, was initiated and supported by Democrat Coulter.
Through his spokesman Steve Huber, Bouchard said on Thursday that he was willing to participate in an independent review.
“We would be perfectly willing to participate in an independent review, as we did with the Guidepost review,” Huber said, referring to the consulting firm that reviewed the Oxford school district’s response. “When we asked for funding for the (after-action review) over two and a half years ago, we were denied, and we managed to conduct one ourselves in subsequent years.”“
However, the Guidepost investigation and accompanying report were limited to examining the school district’s role and response to the attack – but not to examining the emergency responders.
Dispute over financing battle
Bouchard’s police department conducted a debriefing a month after the attack. Changes resulting from that review included hiring a software vendor to create a priority register system within the dispatch center’s computer system and creating a tactical response team for major incidents, sheriff’s officials said. They also increased their response staff and annually review fire department logs.
Bouchard’s claims that the county council denied him funding to hire a videographer to make a video of the incident were not true, Woodward said.
“I was never asked for a debriefing, nor were any of the commissioners, and no amendment was ever made for such an action,” Woodward said. “It was the sheriff’s office’s decision not to participate in the review with the (Oakland County) Department of Homeland Security.”
“That notion is very repugnant,” he added. “To suggest in any way that Oakland County said we would not fund debriefing is complete nonsense. We will make that a practice going forward.”
Woodward said it would be inappropriate for Bouchard to conduct his own investigation and that an independent investigation must be conducted in the future. The county council would have to decide how to hire a third party to conduct the investigation; it is not clear how much that would cost.
“There is no way that his own office can do that. As a matter of policy, I would recommend to our board in such cases that they hire an independent body to prepare an AAR,” Woodward said. “That is the approach that every other agency and institution uses in such incidents.”
“If there is a problem, we need to identify it and fix it,” he added.
Woodward said he did not expect the board to oppose the funding, but he believed the state should also pay for such investigations. He also said such investigations should be carried out in a timely manner. The Oxford attack occurred 32 months ago.
Oxford MP reacts
Republican Rep. Josh Schriver, whose district includes Oxford, said Thursday in response to questions from first responders reported by The News that a debriefing of the operations needs to be conducted and he said Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel should do it.
Parents of the victims in Oxford have also asked Nessel, a Democrat, to investigate the response to the shooting. Nessel’s department has stressed that her office cannot launch its own investigation without the permission of the Oxford school board unless there is reasonable suspicion that a crime was committed. Nessel’s office has said the school board has rejected two separate offers for her office to investigate in 2021 and 2022.
Schriver said he had been in discussions with Nessel’s office about conducting an independent investigation.
“Nessel can do it. Why didn’t she do it? That’s the question all the families in Oxford have been asking,” Schriver said. “For me, what’s needed right now is an investigation into this specific situation, which is constantly evolving.”
“It’s unbelievable to read that the emergency services have to carry out operations themselves,” he added. “There are many unanswered questions.”
The victims’ families have also asked the State Board of Education for an independent investigation into the shooting, funded by the Michigan State Legislature, that would include emergency response. The request was sent to all state legislators on June 12. No legislator responded with a specific statement or response, Department of Education officials said.
State Board of Education member Tom McMillin (R-Oakland Township) opposed the measure, saying he asked the panel in June to approve language in the resolution that would have called on state lawmakers to create a special committee and give it the power to issue subpoenas to investigate the attack.
“We need a bipartisan committee with subpoena power. That will be our only chance,” McMillin told The News in June.
On Thursday, McMillin reiterated his concerns and pushed for the creation of a bipartisan subcommittee with subpoena power.
“A bipartisan committee of the state House of Representatives or Senate with subpoena power is really the only way to find out the whole truth about what happened that day at Oxford High School,” McMillin said.
