Arenas

Back to Facility Manager Contents

Back to Home

Having attended the inaugural Academy for Venue Safety & Security (AVSS), I was astounded by the depth of information provided. This is the first part of the equation— the first “1.” As professional facility managers, I am confident that we have all considered many aspects that are meant to safeguard our patrons and our facilities.

At the Academy, the attendees were enlightened to what some may refer to as “minuscule” details and considerations relating to the most effective preparations of a facility for the safe and secure production of an event. From a personal stance, I found that there were many additional, low profile areas of concern and attention. Interruption from any act against a facility can be very damaging to the reputation and financial well-being of a facility.

The expansion of my vocabulary to include hardening the facility, aggressive crowds, chemical and biological agents (CBA’s), vulnerability analysis, incendiary explosive device (IED), critical assets, Riacin, Sarin, crowd metering, etc., has added to my ability to plan and produce safe events at the facility. The AVSS sessions included detailed information disseminated from a variety of experts, including the Department of Homeland Security.

My experience in the arena management industry has given me a plethora of information and experiential knowledge. This historical background must be continually supplemented with information garnered from many sources to maintain a high level of personal expertise in many areas. Expertise in crowd management, technology, and safety are key areas fundamentally necessary for the protection of patrons.

At this point I would like to move on to the second part of the equation—the “+1” piece. While in Dallas for the AVSS, I spent a fair amount of time on the phone confirming final details of a major concert for the early October time frame. As most arena executives would agree, the confirmation of a major show tends to be very exciting. One of the key details that made this show stand out from others was the fact that it was to be part of a political movement, attempting to garner support for voter registration, with the ultimate goal of swaying the election.

As several of my colleagues and I were finding out, this seemed to be very popular with about one half of our potential patrons and administrators, and fairly unpopular with the approximate other one half. The political overtones of the proposed show sent some shivers, legitimate or not, down the spines of our local support constituency, at all levels.

The time was right to “kick it up a notch or two” relating to all of our services, policies, and procedures. An initial meeting with our security director and my associate director set the stage for this exercise. We looked at virtually everything we did relating to the production of any event at the facility. While doing this, with great dreams of unlimited resources, we focused on the absolute best case scenario from a planning standpoint. What could be done with unlimited resources of all types, manpower through the financial spectrum?

The AVSS conference gave us the ability to draw upon expertise and materials from the best in the nation. Our first move was to identify legitimate areas of major concern. These areas included, but were not limited to: outside security and perimeter, inside security and safety, communications, coordination with local agencies, free speech, protestors, VIP’s, deliveries, etc.

All of these issues are standard points in our planning, but my intent was to ratchet it up a notch, setting the stage for a higher level of performance by the staff and ancillary support mechanisms. Our focus was not to “push the panic button,” but to ready the facility in a manner that would ensure the future safety and security of our patrons and workforce. I scheduled three meetings with all staff and agencies we normally work with for the purpose of clarifying every point and sub-point under each concern. The cooperation and feedback was thorough, intense, and enlightening (to all parties, myself included). There were statements made like: “You CAN limit free speech,” “I never thought of that,” “They need a permit to protest?” “Why don’t you want deliveries on show day?” and the list goes on.

A collective agreement quickly formed. Our focus, from all departments, became the production of the safest and most secure environment we could possibly pull together with the resources available. Team effort did, indeed, create a completely safe and positive event from move-in until move-out was completed.

One plus one is, indeed, greater than two. Taken simply, the AVSS conference was a source of information to add tools to our training, policies, procedures and event planning. This is a single piece of the puzzle. Carried to the next level, adding this piece to the one encompassing an event and all of the planning involved, facility staff will quickly find that the “AVSS” piece combined with the “event” piece will produce far more than the simple equations connotation. The sum of the information and implementation has the result of well planned and thought out events that will provide a safe and secure atmosphere for the facility patron. The far reaching ramifications of making the increased awareness garnered from the exercise part of a new standard operating procedure will pay dividends far beyond a single event.

John Siehl, CFE, is executive director of the Ervin J. Nutter Center on the campus of Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio. He can be contacted at john.siehl@wright.edu.