Last spring a lecture by Daniel Pipes was scheduled in Kane Hall. It was just one of hundreds of public lectures the University hosts each year, but it was a controversial event. Pipes, the director of the Middle East Forum and a columnist for both the New York Post and the Jerusalem Post, holds what some would call passionately pro-Israeli and anti-Palestinian views. So it was no surprise that protesters showed up at the lecture or that police on duty found it necessary to clear the lobby.
The event would probably have been forgotten by now, had it not been for the complaints of one lecture attendee who claimed the police had singled him out for abuse because of his Middle Eastern descent. The police were eventually cleared of wrongdoing after an investigation, but the whole affair threw the spotlight on a process the University has painstakingly set up in hopes of avoiding just such an incident.
鈥淥bviously, the University doesn鈥檛 shy away from controversy. That鈥檚 part of who we are and what we do,鈥� says Norm Arkans, associate vice president and executive director of University Relations. 鈥淏ut when we do have events at which there may be controversy, we want to make sure we provide a safe environment for the speaker to be able to speak and for the audiences to be able to one, attend the lecture, and two, if they do wish to protest, have a safe and secure way in which they can voice their protest.鈥�
Arkans chairs the Use of University Facilities (UUF) Committee, the group charged with overseeing the planning of public events on campus. Any event sponsored by a campus unit or organization that is open to the general public must be reviewed and approved by the committee. Most of the time, that approval is given almost automatically, Arkans says, but when events are controversial, it鈥檚 a different matter.
鈥淧art of our responsibility,鈥� he explains, 鈥渋s to make sure the event sponsors are talking to campus police, to parking, that they have considered how they鈥檙e going to handle crowd control, whether they鈥檙e going to have overflow rooms, whether they鈥檙e going to be conducting visual inspections of bags, how they鈥檙e going to do that, what staffing level they need, and so on.鈥�
In other words, the UUF committee tries to warn the sponsors about what might happen and what they need to think about to ensure that the event goes smoothly. Probably among the first people those groups will contact are Sgt. Kaye Shea, who is the UW Police Department鈥檚 officer in charge of special events and/or her supervisor, Lt. Ray Wittmier. One or both of them will meet with event organizers and others to figure out what needs to be done.
Any number of people might be present at that meeting, Shea says. If it鈥檚 a student event, representatives of the Student Activities Office will be there along with the organizers. A representative from the building in which the event is to be held will often come too. 鈥淲e try to organize everyone who might have one piece of the scenario,鈥� Shea says.
At the meeting, organizers will be asked what kind of history the speaker has with regard to protests and whether there have been any threats made against him or her. 鈥淚f we know ahead of time that that鈥檚 the case, we immediately heighten our security measures,鈥� Shea says. 鈥淎 lot of times the speaker will request additional security. We make arrangements then for the speaker to arrive safely on campus by bringing them into a secure location where we arrange to have officers meet them and escort them into the facility.鈥�
In those cases, the police say, they also have to have what they call a rescue and evacuation plan; in other words, a way to get the speaker out of the building and away from campus quickly, should things get ugly.
After that initial planning meeting, those involved stay in touch and may decide to meet again as new information develops. Such things as advance publicity and activities by protest groups can make a difference in the atmosphere, Shea and Wittmier say. In the case of the Pipes lecture, for example, e-mails were flying between protesters and organizers long before Pipes arrived, and a local radio station whipped up interest in the larger community by discussing the coming lecture on the air.
Police who work at controversial events have one goal, Shea and Wittmier say 鈥� to keep the peace. They ask organizers to make an announcement before the event saying, 鈥淚f you are disruptive you will be warned once. If you repeat the behavior you鈥檙e subject to ejection.鈥� The first contact with a disruptive audience member is usually made by the organizers. Only if the person continues to be disruptive do the police intervene.
鈥淚n most cases, a third warning by the police will handle it or they鈥檒l leave voluntarily,鈥� Shea says. 鈥淚f not, they鈥檙e removed. In most cases they鈥檙e just told, 鈥榊ou鈥檙e out of here鈥� and they鈥檙e escorted out. If there is some resistance, then they are escorted through an elbow hold or wrist hold.鈥�
At the Pipes lecture, the problem was not in the auditorium but in the lobby, where two opposing groups began arguing with each other. Police eventually asked everyone to leave, and they say all but one person 鈥� the person who complained about his treatment 鈥� complied.
It鈥檚 a prime example of how things can still go wrong no matter how much you plan. Shea says planners met four times to talk about the Pipes lecture, but they focused on what might happen in the lecture hall. The problem turned out to be in the lobby.
鈥淎s we鈥檙e thinking about it, we might ask ourselves how we could have avoided having a crowd out in the lobby to begin with,鈥� Arkans says. 鈥淭hat would have entailed an overflow room.鈥�
But Wittmier says that police are 鈥渁lmost in a no-win situation鈥� in connection with controversial events. 鈥淭here are people who are going to want to be there to create a disturbance,鈥� he says. 鈥淭hey鈥檒l do that and there鈥檒l be an interaction (with police or with counter-protesters). Some people鈥檚 determination of success is that there鈥檚 no interaction, but sometimes it鈥檚 totally unavoidable.鈥�
But despite the problems the University faces, Arkans, who has served on the UUF committee for 17 years and chaired it for 12, has never known the committee to deny a speaker鈥檚 appearance because of fear of controversy. It came close a couple of years ago when a group of anti-abortion crusaders came to campus with a display of enlarged photographs and other materials designed to provoke a reaction. But, with heavy police involvement, the display went on.
鈥淚t made a lot of people angry, but I think it was also one of our finer moments,鈥� Arkans says. 鈥淚t showed we were able to accept views that we knew would offend a lot of people in both directions. We were saying 鈥榃e can deal with these sorts of things because of the kind of place we are.鈥� 鈥�