Biography

Currently, the Safety and Emergency Services Analyst for Heartland Community College (Normal, Illinois), Mr. Gehrand is responsible for developing, training, and implementing all phases of the Emergency Management Cycle for the College.  Compliance, with federal, state, and local laws and regulations is a major component of his work in preparing the College for natural and man-made disasters. 

Mr. Gehrand spent four years conducting training and program development for a number of programs funded under the Illinois Terrorism Task Force. Mr. Gehrand did program development and extensive training for the School and Campus Security Training Program in both the K-12 and higher education curriculum.  In addition, his knowledge and expertise in Incident Command permitted him to be an instructor for the Illinois Fire Service Institute (fsi.uiuc.edu) as part of the Homeland Security Training program.  When not otherwise involved in teaching, Keith was a private consultant to schools both at the K-12 and higher education level working on everything from Emergency Operation Plans to full-scale exercises.

Keith Gehrand is a retired police officer and command officer from the Illinois State University Police Department. During his tenure he served in both patrol and investigative capacities and rose through the ranks retiring in 2007 at the rank of Captain and Patrol Division Commander. In addition to providing basic police services Captain Gehrand was active in many aspects of the university community including residential life, student affairs, athletics, and health programs. He helped to develop the Students on Patrol (STOP) program for the campus and supervised the day-to-day operations for the first ten years of its existence. In his twenty-six plus years of service Captain Gehrand was a frequent lecturer and speaker to a variety of campus, local, state, and national groups. Additionally he was the co-creator of the Metro Law Enforcement Explorer Post which served all of McLean County.

In addition to his full-time police employment Captain Gehrand spent five years working part-time in local law enforcement in a rural McLean County police agency. There he was involved in routine patrol, special events, and special investigations.

Captain Gehrand continues to be a member of the Domestic Preparedness Committee of the International Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators and was the co-chairman of the Best Practices Committee which developed a model emergency operations plan under a United States Department of Homeland Security grant.

Captain Gehrand holds a Bachelor's Degree in Health Education from Illinois State University and graduate coursework in Criminal Justice Sciences. He is a graduate of the Northwestern University Center for Public Safety School of Police Staff and Command.

Upon his retirement Mr. Gehrand became a private consultant on matters related to higher education policing and disaster preparedness. In addition he was a member of the Illinois Terrorism Task Force/Campus Security Task Force and was instrumental in the development of the State of Illinois first training seminar for college and university administrators on preparing for critical incidents on campus. Additionally, Mr. Gehrand participated in the development of the first state-wide training seminar on Threat Assessment Teams for higher education.

Mr. Gehrand serves as an instructor for multiple levels of training for the Incident Command System in training required under the National Incident Management System, United States Department of Homeland Security and Presidential Homeland Security Directive number five. He has experience as a developer, facilitator, and evaluator for numerous drills and exercises on police response as well as emergency planning and management.

In addition to his work and experience in law enforcement Mr. Gehrand also served on a multitude of committees and boards both on campus and in the Bloomington-Normal-McLean County groups. Mr. Gehrand is a former president of the Board of Director's for the McLean County Center for Human Services; the McLean County Disaster Council, the Law and Justice Commission, Mobile Training Unit 8 Advisory Board, and Co-chairman of the Minority and Police Partnership; as well as participating on other local boards.

Mr. Gehrand specializes in emergency and disaster response to a variety of emergencies not only to higher educational institutions, but also to primary and secondary schools as well as communities of all sizes. This includes not only police response but also response by fire and emergency medical response in situations involving natural and man-made disasters as well as terrorist incidents.