City to Weigh Police Measures, Future of Surfing Competition

Police crowd control tactics and the future of the Op Pro Surfing Championships--after their brawling conclusion Sunday--will be top agenda items at tonight’s Huntington Beach City Council meeting, city officials said Monday.

“I’m sure there will be a lot of investigation, inquiry and looking at reports,” said Councilman Don MacAllister.

Councilwoman Ruth Finley voiced “complete disappointment” with the way the riot unfolded. She declined to comment on whether 20 officers were sufficient to control the crowd of 70,000 that turned out on the beach Sunday. She said “that’s something we’ll be looking at” when the council meets tonight.

In the course of the Sunday melee, a dozen people were injured, 10 were arrested and five police vehicles were destroyed. Before the rampage ended, more than 140 officers from surrounding Orange County jurisdictions were called in to assist the Huntington Beach officers assigned to control the crowd.

At least three council members said they hoped the surfing championships would return to the city, which has long been associated with the sport, if changes can be made to prevent a repetition of the riot. None reported receiving any complaints of police brutality.

“We’ll be discussing crowd control in the future,” said MacAllister, who was a guest of honor at the surfing competition and an eyewitness to the riot. “Different kinds of crowd control may be needed.”

MacAllister blamed the violence on 35 to 40 “instigators.”

“The people who caused the problems were outsiders,” he said.

The councilman also defended police handling of the incident.

“I still feel they did the right thing. They had to get control. That was the only thing they could do,” he said. “You can always be an armchair general.”

Opinion was mixed as to whether the number of personnel assigned to the event was adequate.

Asked Monday night whether 20 police officers were enough to provide proper crowd control at the annual Ocean Pacific Pro Surfing contest, Sgt. Ron Jenkins of the Huntington Beach police said: “Obviously, it was not this year. But it was plenty last year . . . when nothing happened.”

Jenkins said the City Council needed to reconsider “the whole thing.” However, he said that he had never worked the surfing championships and could not offer advice on how to maintain peace at the beach if another incident like Sunday’s erupted again.

“But, remember, it took 250 police officers before it was over with, so additional (patrol) officers out there wouldn’t have helped (Sunday),” Jenkins said.

A larger police presence “probably would have helped in this situation,” said Councilwoman Ruth Bailey, who attended the competition.

No Problems in the Past

“There were no problems with that many officers in the past,” MacAllister said.

However, a bikini-ripping incident on the last day of the 1983 championships required Huntington Beach police to call in 30 of its own officers and to request assistance from departments in Newport Beach, Costa Mesa, Fountain Valley, Seal Beach and Westminster, and the Orange County Sheriff’s Department.

Charles Thompson, Huntington Beach city administrator, said the number of officers assigned to the championships represented a “normal complement” and that “double or triple that number maybe wouldn’t have made a difference.” Under the circumstances of the riot, he said, it might have taken as many as 200 officers to deter the crowd.

The City of Pasadena, which hosts the annual Rose Bowl Parade Festival, attracted more than 1.5 million people last January, according to Police Sgt. Michael Vandergrift. In order to cope with such large numbers of people, many of whom sleep the sidewalk in order to maintain a good viewing point for the parade, the 220-member police force contracts for assistance from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and the California Highway Patrol.

800 Sheriff’s Deputies

This augmented force, including as many as 800 sheriff’s deputies, patrols the streets and sidewalks around the clock during the festival. With such a visible, high-profile presence, Vandergrift said, “we solve any problem before it becomes a major problem.”

While saying “it’s too early to make any final conclusions,” MacAllister said that if the championships do return in the future, the beach area between the Huntington Beach Pier and the lifeguard station that came under attack Sunday could be cordoned off. “We could have that as a controlled area during the contest,” he said.

Thompson said that cordoning off the area is “a good idea,” as did Bailey, who suggested charging admission to the event.

Finley suggested it might be easier to handle the surfing championships if they were separated from the Labor Day Weekend, normally “the biggest weekend of the year” for Huntington Beach.

“That could be true,” MacAllister said of the proposal. “It’s hard to say.”

Thompson said that there might be “a lot of significance” to moving the championships, perhaps to after Labor Day, when the event would attract a “fairly close regional audience. We don’t make any money off this (competition), anyway.”

“It’s true that economically it does not bring in that much to the city,” Bailey said.

When the weather is nice on Labor Day weekend, Thompson said, the beaches are filled, regardless of the competition.

Alcohol Factor

Another factor in the riot, police said, was the use of alcohol. Numerous injuries were caused by thrown beer bottles. Bailey said that banning bottles of all kinds from the beach might also help.

Drinking is prohibited on the city’s beach, which stretches from Beach Boulevard to north of Golden West Avenue.

“We try to keep very close control on that, and we normally do,” MacAllister said.

“There’s always the possibility that people were drinking illegally,” Finley said. Drinking is also prohibited on Bolsa Chica State Beach, which borders the city beach north of Golden West. However, drinking is permitted at Huntington State Beach, about a mile south of the Huntington Beach pier, according to Michael Tope, a lifeguard supervisor.

There have been fewer problems at Huntington State Beach, Tope said, because the area attracts fewer people overall, and more families.

“Whenever you get a lot of people and alcohol you’re going to have problems,” Tope said.