Should Naperville bookshop pay for Bush visit security?
Naperville played host to former President George W. Bush on Monday and now there are questions about who should foot the bill for the additional police presence his visit required.
City council members Doug Krause and Paul Hinterlong brought up the question of who should pay for the seven uniformed Naperville police officers and other city services used to close Jefferson Avenue in front of Anderson's Bookshop and help the Secret Service keep Bush safe as he greeted more than 1,200 fans inside the downtown store.
Krause said he heard from downtown businesses that lost customers during the roughly six hours that Jefferson was closed between Main and Webster streets.
Perhaps, Krause said, major events such as a visit from a former president should be held outside the city's commercial core.
Or, “maybe the bookstore should be responsible for the additional cost,” he said.
Anderson's owner, Becky Anderson, said the store only had about a week to prepare for Bush's visit once Crown Publishing Group chose to have the 43rd president appear there to promote his new book “41: A Portrait of My Father.”
She said the store contracted with Naperville police to have three officers on duty during the event for four hours each, at a rate of $70 per hour, or $840 total. Past that, Anderson said any police presence, road closures or parking lot closures were at the discretion of the Secret Service.
“We had no idea that the whole entire lot was going to be closed down and the street in front of us,” Anderson said about the Paw Paw parking lot northwest of the store and the block of Jefferson Avenue that both were closed before and after the 2 p.m. Monday book signing. “That was all the Secret Service's deal.”
Still, Hinterlong said the Bush visit didn't follow the city's typical special events process that requires advanced approval and payment for all police and city services.
“Out of fairness, we have a special events process and typically, with all the personnel that helped out on this event, that would have been paid for by whoever is holding the event,” Hinterlong said during a city council meeting Tuesday night. “Did anyone get a bill for all the extra police that were down there?”
Naperville Police Chief Robert Marshall said he could send a bill to the Secret Service and see if the agency pays it — a response that drew some laughs, but not from Hinterlong
“Was this the Secret Service's event or the bookstore's event?” said Hinterlong, who is running for re-election to his council seat next spring against 19 other candidates for eight seats, including Anderson.
Marshall did not specify the exact cost the city incurred to police the event Monday. But he did say the police department will evaluate “lessons learned” from the festivities to determine if there are better ways to communicate with downtown merchants when a special event will attract hundreds of people or require street closures.
Other city council members said they recognized the event inconvenienced some businesses near Anderson's, but the benefit to the city outweighs the short-lived nuisance.
“It's pretty extraordinary to have a former president come,” council member Judith Brodhead said. “There was a lot of good publicity that came out of it for the town.”
Anderson also said the store's events, which drew 55,000 people in 2013 beyond the store's regular customers, help support the business environment in the city.
“We feel that the economic boost that gives to restaurants and other businesses in the downtown area is a huge impact,” she said. “We heard from some of our neighbors that they got a lot of business while people were in line.”