The 42nd annual Great Midwest Marijuana Harvest Festival parade on State Street took place Sunday, even though the group chose not to pay for special duty police officers to block traffic.
Madison Police Department spokesperson Joel DeSpain said MPD now recommends events such as parades or marches downtown pay a fee for special duty police officers to block traffic at their events.
The fee was initially announced as a requirement for any marches downtown, but according to Ald. Mike Verveer, District 4, the fee is now optional after Mayor Paul Soglin heard about the policy. Verveer said the mayor directed the MPD to come down on the side of the First Amendment by giving protesters the option of paying for the special duty officers.
The special duty officers volunteer in advance for marches and are paid directly by the groups that escort the marches. This new policy has been going on since spring 2012, according to Verveer.
Special duty officers have been around many years and typically attend events such as University of Wisconsin football games, DeSpain said.
“In the past, we haven’t recommended them downtown but in this day and age, we’re having to take a look at our limited resources and what the costs are and decided it would be better to have people pay for the service they’re seeking,” DeSpain said. “If people want to hold their event without it, they just won’t have them.”
The Harvest Festival participants had never been asked to give such a large amount of money in the past and were caught off-guard by the required payment of extra officers before Soglin made it optional, Verveer said.
DeSpain said the Harvest Festival chose to march down State Street Sunday without paying for the additional police staff. He said the cost of having special duty officers at the Harvest Festival would have been a couple hundred dollars.
“I believe the group has decided they don’t want to have them so they’re just going to go ahead and hold their gatherings without special duty officers,” DeSpain said. “We’ll police [the parade] with just our existing staff to the best of our ability.”
Ald. Scott Resnick, District 8, said extra police officers also attend events to control any fights that break out in addition to blocking traffic, but that is a rare occurrence because most protests go on without problems.
The march blocked traffic while it took place and did not let cars get in the way of the protest. Participants of the festival frequently cheered loudly when nearby cars trying to get through honked their horns at the protestors.
Bobby Schopp, who marched with protesters, said the traffic was not bad during the parade because the march was short and often did not stop for cars.
Laura Whitmore, spokesperson for Madison Parks, said in an email to The Badger Herald even though the Harvest Festival protesters chose not to have special duty officers at their event, they did obtain a Street Use Permit from the city of Madison for the weekend. She said their march from State Street to the Capitol requires a separate permit from city and Capitol Police.
Resnick said there are a couple things to consider when it comes to groups paying for extra police staff to cover their events in terms of freedom of speech.
“I don’t believe the city should be in the position to limit free speech but when that does come at the cost of taxpayers and taxpayer resources, that’s where it’s a very difficult balancing test,” Resnick said.
DeSpain said there haven’t been any major problems with the Harvest Festival in the past because they typically protest peacefully. He said MPD did not expect to see major problems at the march from not having special duty officers present.
