As 2015 approached the middle of its 11th month, venue owners and operators (and the whole world) got a shocking reminder that public venue security is a very serious concern. In coordinated terrorist attacks at six spots in and around Paris, terrorists killed 130 people and injured more than 350. All of the attacks were conducted at public spaces, two at event venues, a very large sports stadium and a fairly small live-performance theater.
The headlines reporting the terrorist attacks at Stade de France, however, were not quite as horrific as the November mayhem.
The messages in these headlines referencing the stadium incident were certainly alarming but they also contained encouraging words. Words that pointed to the efficacy of good security measures and training. The terrorist bombers did not reach their goal, did not get into the venue where nearly 80,000 people were amassed to watch France play Germany in a soccer match. Though one life was lost, not counting those of the terrorists, and several other people were injured, it could have been much worse.
Since then the U.S. has had its own domestic terrorism experience in San Bernardino at the Inland Regional Center facility.
So where are we in terms of venue security in the post-Paris world? How are things looking for 2016 and beyond? Though vigilance is called for at any kind of venue, sports venues generally get the preponderance of attention since hundreds of millions of people in the U.S. attend sporting events at more than 10,000 stadiums across the nation.
Dr. Lou Marciani, director of National Center for Spectator Sports Safety and Security (NCS4) found the Paris attacks abhorrent, yet instructive.
“We saw a few things in Paris that we haven’t seen before,” noted Marciani. “One was that a person at the stadium responsible for working the gate turned away the person who turned out to be one of the terrorists. That means they’re doing something right regarding training. Also, in that situation, we saw multiple attacks, the use of IEDs, the taking of hostages. So we have to look at our playbook, too, and look at training our folks down the road to look at more diverse issues relative to an attack. We need to move those security perimeters away from stadiums as much as we can so we don’t have an explosion right on top of the stadium.”
CHANGES COMING?
Steve Adelman, principal at Scottsdale, Ariz.-based Adelman Law Group and an attorney who specializes in sports and entertainment event production on emergency and severe weather plans, workplace safety programs and overall venue security and risk management, responded to Paris quickly at his website with four things that professionals can do to protect their venues and the people in them. Put simply in abbreviated form, they include these dictums: add technology, add guards, add CPTED (the Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design elements) and improve communications, especially with threat-monitoring organizations.
Marciani’s NCS4 is affiliated with the University of Southern Mississippi and is in an active relationship with INTERPOL, the Lyon, France-based international police organization. NSC4 conducts training and academic research regarding venue security.
“We have five different Summits here at the Center for marathons, high school athletics, intercollegiate athletics, universities and professional stadiums,” explained Marciani. “There are about 125 thought-leaders per Summit and we’ll look at best practices. We do this annually because best practices include continuous improvements. Our contribution to this whole mechanism is based on continuous improvement so we can be better prepared than we were yesterday.”
The seventh annual National Sports Safety and Security Conference and Exhibition is scheduled for July 12-14, 2016 at the JW Marriott Desert Ridge Resort in Phoenix.
ABOUT CCICADA
Another major player in the U.S. venue security field is The Command, Control and Interoperability Center for Advanced Data Analysis (CCICADA), operating out of
Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, directed by Dr. Fred Roberts, professor of mathematics at the university.
“We develop and recommend best practices, metrics for testing how well a venue operator is doing, metrics for testing training, and that sort of thing,” said Roberts. “We do not actually provide the training.”
CCICADA uses advanced data analysis and systems to study natural and manmade threats to the safety and security of people in the U.S., primarily while at sports stadiums. It is the lead university in a 17-institution partnership. CCICADA developed a “Best Practices in Anti-Terrorism Security in Sports Venues” (BPATS) guidebook in 2013 that offers guidance to venue owners and operators for submitting an application for the security-insurance coverage provided under the federal Support Anti-terrorism by Fostering Effective Technologies (SAFETY) Act. BPATS is also a resource for the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Safety Act Implementation (OSAI).
“The main point is the Safety Act was originally intended to give designation or certification to smaller-type technology that could be used in counterterrorism and give some liability insurance for them,” explained Roberts. “They have now expanded that concept to a much broader interpretation. That’s where the stadium security measures came from and giving liability insurance to stadiums and venues of all kinds that have achieved some sort of certification in terms of their counterterrorism plans. These types of certifications can be as small as for a certain kind of approved walk-through metal detector and can result in the user having insurance available.”
At least five NFL stadiums: MetLife Stadium, East Rutherford, N.J.; M&T Bank Stadium, Baltimore; FedEx Field, Landover, Md.; AT&T Stadium in Dallas; and Lincoln Financial Field, Philadelphia, have used CCICADA’s assessment tools.
The Homeland Security office was so impressed with BPATS it awarded CCICADA a second project, “Best Practices in Anti-terrorism Security (BPATS) Tier II,” more simply called BPATS II. It calls for development of ways to assess effectiveness of security measures.
“Venue operators have a challenge in balancing security and patron satisfaction,” acknowledged Roberts. “That became loud and clear when people tried to wand everybody. So, they moved on to the next stage when the NFL asked everybody to use walk-through metal detectors. Major League Baseball is going in that direction, too. Then the question becomes, ‘How well do they work, in situations for which they weren’t designed?’ It’s a windy, cold day, people have heavy coats on, they don’t want to take them off, you don’t want to make them take them off. So how well do these things really work? It’s a work in progress to really understand that and to understand how to use them properly, what settings to use and other technological issues.”
Of course, while sports stadiums and other sports venues get the most attention, security apparatus and methods hold in large degree for other kinds of venues.
SEE SOMETHING, SAY SOMETHING
The Bataclan attack has moved Live Nation to increase its safety procedures though the organization understandably declined to give further details. AEG Live, another prominent concert promoter, reportedly increased security measures for a Justin Bieber event at the Staples Center in Los Angeles soon after the Paris attacks.
Though it is understandably a work in progress, Adelman is somewhat cynical about any drastic uptick in security effectiveness.
“One of the things we saw in Paris, at the nightclub, they didn’t have walk-through magnetometers or, from what I understand, hand-held wand magnetometers,” noted Adelman. “They just did the usual perfunctory pat-down and maybe a bag check. That’s still what’s done in most smaller venues and unless magically they acquire massive budgets to increase their technology, that’s still what’s going to happen. At the risk of sounding cynical, no, I don’t think Paris is going to change the way we do security at public accommodations. Certainly, each tragedy yields new people who take safety and security seriously but as far as industry-wide changes, no, I don’t see significant changes coming after Paris.”
Marciani of NCS4, which has among its primary objectives going forward the production of a Professional Sport Facilities Best Practices Guide in 2016, and create by 2019 an international best practices outline through the partnership with INTERPOL, has a somewhat different perspective.
“I think we’ve reinforced the word ‘vigilance,’” said Marciani. “See something, say something. I’ve seen a great change in our country since 9/11 and we’ve really started to focus in on people being first responders. We’re all first responders at a game. You see something you don’t like, you need to speak up immediately. It’s tough to manage some of these venues with such large numbers of people. So, vigilance, see something say something, perimeter considerations, information sharing, social media, security training, multiple attacks, IEDs — those are the things we’re taking away post-Paris.”
Adelman also sees one general design improvement likely to become more common. “When new structures are created, new football stadiums for example,” said Adelman, “I predict that security checkpoints will be farther away from the entrance to the building. The reason for that is what we saw at the soccer stadium outside of Paris, where the person had an explosive IED vest and because he was asked for a ticket and didn’t have one, he exploded the device outside the building. Well, that’s precisely what’s supposed to happen. The farther away one is at that point, the less likely there is going to be damage to either people or property. What I expect will happen is that the security perimeter for large buildings will be moved farther away from the building itself. And that’s a good thing.”
Interviewed for this story: Steve Adelman, (480) 209-2426; Fred S. Roberts, (848) 445-5930; Lou Marciani, (601) 266-5675