Yes, that title is sarcastic.
Saw a picture from the UGA/Ga Tech game with a couple of Georgia State Patrol Troopers on the sidelines; and was hurtled 25-some years into the past, when I was University cop during football season…
Live college football on a Saturday! What could be better? Hang out with (your team) fans a mile from the stadium at a tailgate spot you paid $120 for, gnawing on burgers, delicious ribs, queso and Frito’s Scoops, and all the effin’ PBR you can drink! Heckle the (other team) fans as they walk past towards the stadium; maybe get in a bro-down with one of them before you tape your flask of 151 proof rum to your inner thigh in order to sneak it into the stadium. Stumble your way across the mile to the stadium gates in early fall southern heat. Stop halfway to discreetly puke in the bushes… maybe that last shot of tequila was a bad idea. Enjoy; and thank you for your ticket!
College football brings in a LOT of money to any college or university; and UGA was no exception. The UGA Athletic Association, the group that funds the Bulldogs, is a private, nonprofit corporation somewhat under the control of the University president and a few members elected by UGA faculty. They control ticket prices and fund things like stadium expansion… and Sanford Stadium has a voracious appetite for high-dollar skyboxes. In 2017, they had a surplus of $11.2 million, from expenses of $119.1 million and revenues of $130.1 million; taking into account their payment of $4.5 million back to the school for academics.
$4.5 million gives you a lot of say in what goes on at the school.
So, our highly inebriated football fan who spent $50 for his ticket and $120 for a primo tailgate spot is having the time of his life, and his ticket helps pay for higher education. Very nice.
But what about us poor schmucks who had to keep the lid on this simmering stewpot of football rivalry anger?
Well, it was overtime pay for a 12-16 hour day of sweat and despair for the state of humanity. The following Sunday day shift for the UGA Police Department was predictably subdued, because we were all asleep on our feet.
Our 8-hour shifts in the PD rotated- backwards for Sergeants, like me, and Corporals and Officers; forwards for Lieutenants- every 4 months. This meant that every Fall, I was the 7a-3p shift Sergeant; and the Shift Commander on Saturdays, as that was the Lieutenant’s day off- it’s good to be the king. He was working; but inside the stadium, where most of the overtime people were.
That meant that it was up to Day Shift to handle everything that happened outside the stadium and on UGA property. Sure, there were Athens-Clarke County cops on duty as well; but they had all they could handle taking care of traffic and downtown. Everything else, from Broad Street south, was taken care of by the 6 of us and 3 others on bike patrol.
And that’s where 45,000 drunken college football fans descended most Saturdays in the fall.
Now, if you’re one of the millions of people who goes to college football game and DOESN’T act like an ass, then keep in mind that you’re not the reason that I don’t personally go to tailgates. But, there’s enough of your fellow fans who DO act like 200 pound drunken toddlers in and around the stadium to make game day weekends an eternal hell.
For Day Shift, the day starts at 0700 and shift briefing. The night shift guys we just relieved, after a long night of dealing with drunks and DUIs, were headed home for whatever sleep they could get before they had to report back. I gave the shift briefing with the usual handing out of road and parking lot closures, as well as traffic plans for before and after the game, and timetables for all this. Vehicle and zone assignments made- I always kept my corporal as All Zones with me- notes on expected issues; scalpers selling counterfeit tickets, which frat house has been a pain in the ass lately, areas likely to be hit by entering autos. If it was an early game- which we all liked, because we not only got to go home early; but the fans wouldn’t have as much time to drink beforehand- the Chief and Major might poke their heads in the room for a quick word; after which we’d end shift briefing and go to work.
(Each Lieutenant and Sergeant had their own way of ending shift briefings… no doubt influenced by Sgt. Esterhaus from Hill Street Blues; we all thought
we needed a catch phrase like “Let’s be careful out there”. Mine was to hold up a dollar bill and ask “Who wants to get Standing Order #1?”- which meant, who wants to run the convenience store close to the station and get me a 22 ounce fountain Coke. That seems a little… master/slave; but it started out as a joke. Everyone knew I would get a Coke and return to the station to do some last minute paperwork before heading out on the road; I was really busy one morning and someone volunteered to get it. It quickly became an in-joke; and when I finally left for another agency, the officers presented me with the pictured plaque.)
The disadvantage to an early game is that we had to get out and hustle to make sure everything was ready; which meant prowling the parking lots that were reserved and supposed to be empty (to call tow trucks and remove cars still in them; tow companies made BANK on game days), and start checking the popular tailgating parking lots. Parking Services (a completely separate entity that issued parking tickets-and believe me, there were feuds between them and us) hired people to act as security in these lots; but occasionally conditions devolved into brawls and we had to respond. Others were setting up barricades pre-placed the night before, or ensuring buildings that we didn’t want fans wandering into were locked. And always, somewhere in the middle of this, there was a tenured professor demanding that we tow the car parked in his reserved space RIGHT NOW! All while the Major is bitching over the radio that the reserved lots weren’t empty yet.
But this is the relative calm before the storm. On late game days, the tension built inch by inch as we approached kickoff; as people who have been marinating in alcohol all afternoon finally pack shoulder-to-shoulder into the stadium. Anger flares; small disputes have to be settled before they become big ones, and the 6 of us can’t possibly arrest all of the people committing minor crimes right now- with as overworked as the jail is on a game day, one arrest will tie up one of my 6 officers for an hour at least; right when we need them.
And then there’s the stupid shit– someone put their tailgate coals in a dumpster and set it on fire; here comes the fire department. Seen more than one expensive RV go up that way. Then the complaints- I just bought this ticket from a guy on the corner and the ticket booth told me it was counterfeit; what are you gonna do about it?
OK, got a description of the guy?
Oh, he was a black guy; you know.
…
No, I don’t know. Anything distinguishing about him? Clothes, glasses, hair, mannerisms?
Nah, man; he was a black guy.
…
Gosh, thanks, that’s really helpful. Here’s your case number, and here’s your “they all look the same to me” racism; maybe next time don’t give $200 to some stranger yelling “I gotcha tickets right here!”
Sometimes there’s outright brawls; that can usually be traced back to- once they’re separated and calmed down- one really drunk guy who we reluctantly arrest to get him out of the way someplace he can’t hurt himself or someone else. Or property damage done by a drunk college freshman, who has an automatic underage charge in addition to whatever he just broke. Or, a medical emergency- in the middle of campus, through streets closed to traffic but packed with football fans.
One such call was on a hot September afternoon, 30 minutes before kickoff. It was a late game; and, predictably, everyone was drunk, hot, and tired long before they got to their seats. The Man Down call, elderly female passed out on the sidewalk, was less than a mile from where I was; and I was the closest unit- but I was surrounded by shoulder-to-shoulder fans, all slowly zombie-marching their way to the stadium. Medical emergencies are lights-and-siren calls; 10-18, Code 3, whatever you call it where you are. And, considering that even though our ambulance services had excellent response times, even on a game day; odds are I’d get to the scene long before them… and so I needed to get there right now.
…5 miles an hour, red and blue strobes going full blast, yelp on the siren at 130 db, blasts of the air horn… and the crowd only reluctantly parted to let me through. More than one person yelled “Is the siren really necessary?!?”
Well, yes, actually; it is. This could be YOUR grandmother dying on the sidewalk that I’m going to, you selfish prick.
Five agonizing, white-knuckled, tongue-bitten-through-to-keep-me-from-yelling-what-I-REALLY-wanted-to-say-over-the-PA minutes later, I arrived at the scene.
And there is, in fact, a very frail looking elderly female laying on her side on the hot concrete sidewalk, surrounded by a few concerned fans not related to her. One of them ran up to me as I got out of the car and told me she was moaning, very weak, and had vomited. Heat stroke? I wondered as I pulled on my latex gloves; not the first pair I’d used that day. Head injury from a fall? There was a puddle of vomit by her mouth, and her eyes were closed. I wondered if she was already dead; she was deathly pale and still.
“Ma’am?” I asked as I lightly shook her shoulder. “Can you talk to me? Are you OK?”
She coughed, and rolled over on her back slightly, and looked at me; mouth struggling to gasp out words:
“Fuck you, you son of a bitch!” she slurred out; getting a little bit of extra air on the last word to fling some spittle skywards.
The ambulance arrived about that time, and I quickly turned the scene over to them; concentrating on keeping the area round them clear.
My… great grammaw…
…just told me to go fuck myself.
That’s why I don’t watch college football at the stadium any more.
(Part 2 coming: What about afters? Followed by Part 3: Inside the stadium)