Mark Ford, CPP

Mark is a Senior Consultant with the Lansdowne Consulting Group, Security and Emergency Management Team in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.  Mark leads or works on an array of security and emergency management programs ranging from program reviews, risk assessments to designing and delivering training and exercises.

Mark spent 33 years with the Ottawa Police Service (Canada’s National Capital) and retired at the rank of Acting Deputy Chief.  He spent most of his career in the domain of Emergency Operations, including significant time as a member / leader of the Tactical Unit, Explosives / CBRNE Unit, Special Events Security Planning,  EMBC, and Frontline Operations.  Mark was an Incident Commander for numerous critical incidents / emergencies / Demonstrations / planned security events (G7 / Presidential Visit type events).  Mark is a nationally recognized instructor in the domain  of Critical Incident Command.  Mark was an Ottawa Police Incident Commander for the response to the tragic domestic terrorism attack on Parliament Hill in 2014, that resulted in the tragic murder of the Cpl Cirillo at the national war memorial.

Mark after retiring in July of 2021, entered the private sector to work with Shopify in their executive protection program and transitioned to lead programs related to security awareness training, emergency management and business continuity, event security and travel security.

Mark is a member of the ASIS International Law Enforcement Liaison Steering Committee and the chair of the law enforcement liaison sub-committee for ASIS chapter 140 (Ottawa). 

Mark Has been a longstanding member of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police (CACP), where he co-chaired the national committee on Emergency Management prior to retirement.   Currently he is part of the Private Sector Liaison Committee.

Mark volunteers with Ottawa’s BluesFest (Canada’s largest musical festival) board of directors and leads training / exercises for the organization as it relates to crisis management and emergencies.  Mark is also a board member of the Snowsuit Fund, that delivers more than 17,000 new snowsuits annually to children in the community, who could not otherwise afford them.