Thousands of people will gather this weekend in Indianapolis for the 2015 NCAA Men’s Final Four tournament, but as with other large public events, along with the positive exposure for the city comes responsibility – to safeguard public security and safety.
The Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department (IMPD) partners with federal and state agencies to ensure all attendees feel both welcome and safe while visiting Indianapolis.
“The last thing we want is a TSA pat down for a sporting event,” commented Eric Dietz, director of the Purdue Homeland Security Institute, and professor of computer and information technology at Purdue University.
He said while there is always room for improvement, the city counts on managing the weekend’s anticipated large crowds the way they have for several decades.
“We have to maintain balance in the delivery of security, the expectation and cost. We do a lot of planning beforehand with a large staff for help with crowd control.”
Law enforcement agencies routinely plan and train between 12-18 months prior to the event to ready their members to handle major threats, man made disasters and unexpected weather.
“Think about the (Indiana) State Fair a couple of years ago. We have to be cognizant of all of those things that could impact the weekend,” said Dietz. “The last thing we would want is an emergency to happen and for people not know what to do.”
Security planning also includes placement of security cameras, road closures and detours. IMPD Deputy Chief Michael Bates said Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. will also install 14 surveillance cameras at White River State Park where the NCAA March Madness Music Festival will take place. Currently, surveillance cameras can be found on Georgia Street and at Lucas Oil Stadium.
“It’s a free event so it’s important to us obviously. The security posture there is little bit more than it would be inside (Lucas Oil) because you have to have a ticket to get in the stadium,” he said.
Dietz said the public should feel confident there is a great deal of concern about their safety and hopefully security can be seen as transparent to most visitors.
He also added that a highly-anticipated sporting event doesn’t have to mean trouble.
“These are college basketball tournaments that will hopefully be populated by a lot of our young people. You can have some maturity issues with that age, but you can also have it with those who are 40 and 50,” mentioned Dietz. “But we recently hosted large events such as Super Bowl so this is a community familiar with managing large crowds. We’ve got a good public safety team.”
Social media will also be used as a resource for safety, he said.
“It allows us from peer to peer to share information, but it also allows the events to share information and answer questions for guests. Threats and risk can be identified through social media. It has greatly enhanced the ability of law enforcement to know where the problem areas are and manage that,” said Dietz.
For more information on the NCAA Final Four weekend activities, visit NCAA.com.
