By KEVIN CANFIELD World Staff Writer
Published: 8/6/2009
Fair Board Chairman and County Commissioner Fred Perry sent a letter to Mayor Kathy Taylor asking the city of Tulsa to provide the law enforcement services necessary for this year’s Tulsa State Fair.
“This can be done with actual on-site Tulsa Police officers or by the city contracting with the Sheriff’s Office,” Perry wrote in a letter hand-delivered to the mayor Wednesday.
For years, the Tulsa County Sheriff’s Office provided law enforcement services at the fair that were supplemented by private security hired by the Tulsa County Public Facilities Authority, which oversees operation of the fairgrounds.
But that was before the city annexed the fairgrounds Jan. 1.
After discussions with the Tulsa Police Department, Expo Square President and CEO Mark Andrus was informed last week that the police would not provide security at this year’s fair without charging a special event fee.
The Police Department will respond to 911 calls.
“We don’t provide internal security for any major function without billing the sponsor for the cost of that security,” Deputy Police Chief Dennis Larsen said last week. “We’re being consistent with what we’ve done for the last 20 years.”
But in his letter, Perry says that in discussions preceding the city’s decision to annex the fairgrounds city officials were made aware that the fair “required a high degree of law enforcement.”
“With this annexation comes the responsibility to provide adequate service to the newly annexed property,” Perry wrote.
Larsen said the city provides security without a charge for only two special events: the Veterans Day parade and the Martin Luther King Day parade.
When it comes to the hundreds of other special events, from the Tulsa Run to Dfest, the sponsor pays for police to provide internal security, he said.
Sheriff Stanley Glanz has estimated that it would cost his office about $300,000 to provide law enforcement at this year’s fair.
By KEVIN CANFIELD World Staff Writer
Copyright Tulsa World 2009. Format differs from original publication.
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