“We tried to mostly use officers there around 12 hours, but there may be a small contingency of detectives who work eight hours and may have to work 12 hours at that time,” said NOPD Deputy Chief Hans Ganthier.
But this plan concerns New Orleans City Council President JP Morrell, who believes the police overtime will only add to the city’s $160 million deficit.
“This activation is going to make our deficit worse, and the revenue generated from it will not cover the cost by any stretch of the imagination,” said Morrell.
In a video on social media, Morrell claims that ahead of the concert, the NOPD reached out to ASM Global, which operates the Smoothie King Center. The department asked if they would foot the bill and hire officers for the concerts.
“There is such a propensity for violence around these concerts. Not an if, but a when, that we are concerned, we’ll have to activate the department to be around the downtown area to protect citizens and revelers,” said Morrell.
But ASM Global declined the offer, saying that if the concerts were to be canceled, it would not be at their request.
“If you send a letter to the promoter making us cancel, you can get it that way. That was an attempt to have the NOPD and the city cancel the concerts. The promoter would sue the city rather than suing ASM,” said Morrell.
Morrell says the concerts do nothing for the city’s economy and only financially benefit ASM Global.
“The revenue that will be generated for the state will not begin to cover how much we are going to have to protect the public and the concert goers,” said Morrell.
Despite these concerns, the concerts are still scheduled to take place. NOPD is asking those attending to enjoy the concert, but to follow the rules and especially leave firearms at home.
“Not only that, you can’t bring them with you, so that means you’re going to leave them in your car. And if you do that, you become a victim of a car burglary, where your gun will be missing. One of our big reductions in crime had to do with auto burglaries,” said Ganthier.
Matthew Stone with the New Orleans Police and Justice Foundation says the NOPD has been on top of this for weeks, in the event of an emergency or a critical incident at the concerts.
“They’ve done tabletop exercises just to plan for the what-ifs. Extremely important because it lets officers know where to stage, let them know where, you know, choke points for ingress and egress will be, where emergency other emergency services should be staged, what partners should be brought in,” said Stone.
WGNO reached out to ASM Global about Morrell’s comments and was told that the security measures of any event held in their facilities, past or present, are something they don’t comment on.
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