Park Police Chief Details Inaugural Security, Advice for Attendees

SAL LAURO, U.S. Park Police. Chief: The events start on [Jan.] 18 with the opening ceremony at the Lincoln Memorial. We’re planning for a large-scale event because [the] President-elect will be there, number one.

And we’ve had a lot of experience as an agency handling large-scale special events and demonstrations. And the one that most closely resembles what we’re putting in place for the event on [Jan.] 18 was the Millennium Celebration.

Where we had the president, a lot of top-level performers perform, we had large crowds. That’s kind of the model we’re using for this event, with some minor changes, some improvements that we think need to be made.

But we’re working very closely with the U.S. Secret Service, since this is a National Special Security Event, that’s part of the, under the umbrella. So we’re in constant contact with them. So we have a very robust plan.

There will be an area closest to the stage and around the Lincoln Memorial where it will be a secured area. Ticketed guests, they will go through magnetometers.

The remainder of the area between Independence and Constitution Avenue from the Lincoln Memorial to 17^th Street will be a secured area and there will be checkpoints that visitors, general public without tickets can come down but they need to go through these checkpoints. And we will manage the size of the crowd hopefully that way.

There will be JumboTrons spaced along the reflecting pool on both sides so that people can see and hear the festivities.

Comparison to Past Inaugurals
Two inaugurals ago, President Bush's first inaugural, current President Bush, he had an opening ceremony at the Lincoln Memorial. So as far as the opening event, we've had events like that.

The big change for us this year is the, on [Jan.] 20, the swearing-in ceremony. In the past, a large portion of the Mall has been reserved, has been closed down and used to stage the parade participants. So that reduced, although we had to secure that area, it reduced the number of people who came down there.

For this inaugural, because of the anticipated large crowds, the determination was made to open the entire Mall to general public. So the change for us have been, whereas in the past we've had to cover a small section of the mall where we had general public, now we have the potential from Fourth Street on the Mall to the Lincoln Memorial being heavily visited.

The other change, if you go to the swearing-in, you can't make it to the parade. And if you try to go to, you can't do both because of the security measures in place, because of, just logistically it doesn't work unless you're someone being escorted. So [the Presidential Inaugural Committee] made the determination to broadcast the parade on all the JumboTrons along the mall. So the people who come down to view the swearing-in on the Mall, we anticipate a large number of them potentially staying and watching either the entire parade or portions of it.

That's been the impact to us. That's it's caused us to bring in additional personnel, modify our plans a little bit. But that's all because of the anticipated large crowds. So we will have on [Jan.] 20, on the National Mall and also in the areas along the parade route we are responsible for the sidewalks on both sides of Pennsylvania Avenue, the entire parade route. So between that and the National Mall, we will have approximately 400 U.S. Park Police, about 600 police officers from surrounding jurisdictions and 1,300 D.C. National Guard working with us so that's going to really help us expand what we can do with large crowds.

They're going to be mainly in a crowd management role, providing security along fence lines and helping us keep a good flow of the crowd, as they're moving into the viewing areas. So there will be a large, a very visible presence of uniformed personnel, from various police, military and non-law enforcement groups.

So we feel that as large as the crowd is, there will be such a strong presence that should any need arise for any assistance, for anything, be it a lost child, medical assistance, or someone sees something suspicious, they can just go to any uniformed officer of any jurisdiction and we will all be in contact with each other via radio cell phones and other means.

Security on the National Mall
From Fourth Street to the Lincoln Memorial there won't be the traditional screening that you see at events like the Fourth of July. But we'll have multiple layers of security, starting out in the suburbs when people are getting on buses, getting on trains and increasing as they get closer in. Some of it will be very visible; other things won't be as visible.

Plus we use, utilizing a lot of technology, cameras, various sensors and items like that. So we feel although there won't be specific visible checkpoints we have very good security in place to mitigate any potential threats.

Advice for the Crowd
First of all, we want law enforcement security to be in the background. We want that to be a secondary thing. They should know that, they should feel safe and secure coming down. This is going to be an historic event.

So we want them to come down, but they need to have clear expectations of what could be occurring. Although we are trying to make it as easy as possible for people to get down and we are putting measures in place with all of the surrounding jurisdictions, people need to understand that there is limited capacity on Metro and on all of the buses. So they will have, it will take them extended periods of time to get down here. They're going to probably be out in the elements for an extended period of time, watching the swearing-in and/or the parade. And then it could take just as many hours to get home as it did to get in.

So they need to understand that although we want them to come, they need to be prepared and be ready. The other thing, if a group is coming down, they should determine when they get here, a rally point where if they get separated they know that at a certain point we're all going to meet at this location. And also if they have children or people with special needs, make sure they have some sort of identification on them and information about any medications or phone numbers, emergency contact numbers.

Finally, just be flexible. Be patient and enjoy the peaceful transfer of power in our country, which I think is one of the things that makes this nation great.

Security Preparation
We try to minimize the impact it's going to have on the city and on the residents and on visitors. So we all work together, the Secret Service, Metropolitan [police], us, Capitol Police, everyone, to try to put these closures in place as late as possible to minimize the impact.

So although you may see fencing being piled up on the street counter in anticipation of on the day of the event, that's going to be stretched across the street. You may see the same with jersey barriers and items like that. But there won't be much done prior to the actual events. On [Jan.] 18 there will be closures and then again on [Jan.] 20.

You always have that nagging thing that there's something we're forgetting but there are so many people involved from so many different agencies that for once I think we've really thought of everything.

The biggest variable is the weather. We can plan as much as we want, but we have no control over that. We can control traffic, we can control crowds. We can't control the weather.

You know, we just have to be ready to adapt depending on what happens with the weather.