Madison and Halloween. Peanut butter and jelly. Barry Bonds and HGH.
All these things are hard to think of without thinking of the other. However, with the new trends of regulation, privatization and commercialization, Halloween in Madison is going to end up like the Notre Dame football program: People only go because they are promised the Mecca that it used to be.
What am I talking about here? Wasn’t Halloween last year a huge success? There weren’t any riots. Arrests were nearly cut in half. The city made money by selling tickets for access to State Street and everyone still had a good time. Right? I’m sorry, folks, but the numbers suggest otherwise.
I’m not just another UW student who thinks the cops should stay home Halloween weekend and let us do whatever we want. That’s just stupid. What I am is a UW student who thinks the city is lying to itself if it thinks it’s moving in the right direction with the Halloween policies it’s implementing.
Last year, nearly 300 police officers called in from all over the area made 244 arrests on State Street, ranging from “depositing human waste” to underage consumption of alcohol to possession of cocaine. The mayor and the police trumpeted this number as a success. The number of arrests from the previous year, 468, was nearly cut in half, right? Right. But wouldn’t you expect that when only slightly more than 34,000 people showed up last year as opposed to more than 80,000 the year before? I’m no math major or anything, but doesn’t that actually make for a higher arrest rate than the previous Halloween? Holy Cieslewicz, it does!
How about the money issue though? Last year’s revelry was sure to make the city a ton of dough through ticket sales and all the money it saved on tear gas. Not so fast, you optimists you. The costs last year totaled around $500,000 with 2005’s total coming in close to $400,000. According to an article published in The Isthmus earlier this year, the 2006 Freakfest cost the city of Madison itself $28,000 more than its 2005 predecessor. A lot of the money loss was due to a drop in the number of fines police handed out and also an increase of funds heading toward other police agencies. The five dollars that it cost to get onto State Street didn’t make enough money to balance out these factors.
With the installation of six high-tech security cameras and two more to come by Friday — according to Channel 3000 — and the hiring of private companies to handle security and musical matters, don’t expect the costs to drop drastically any time soon. They want the event to be a “safe” and “concert-like experience.” If I wanted a concert, I would just walk by the porch of 11 N. Bassett St. Saturday night and get a free show that would blow Lifehouse or Mighty Short Bus out of the water.
Also, the revenue hotels, restaurants and shops lose when more than 45,000 people from out of town who were there the year before decide not to come for the weekend and the days leading up to it. The announcement of Mountain Dew as an official nonalcoholic sponsor to Freakfest 2007 is another step to commercialize the event and try to cut costs, although you never quite know if corporate sponsorship in Madison will drive even more people away.
The city was right when it said it had to stop the riots, which had marred previous Halloween gatherings. However, they city took it way too far, and it needs to stop. It’s as simple as looking at the numbers and statistics and realizing things haven’t worked out quite as swimmingly as one is led to believe.
Keep everyone safe, yes, but stop trying to give Frankenstein a facelift.
Henry Weiner ([email protected]) is a sophomore majoring in political science.
