Public safety 'iceberg': Police, USGA keeping many details about U.S. Open security under wraps

Around 200 police officers from 25 agencies — some of them handling security or crowd control, others parking and traffic details — will form the U.S. Open’s public-safety backbone next week to ensure the men’s golf championship’s 10th trek to the Pittsburgh suburbs goes off without a hitch.

But, when TV cameras pan across crowds of golf lovers at Oakmont Country Club, their lenses likely won’t spot any of them. That’s because many officers won’t sport their typical police-issued uniforms, instead wearing shirts with badges and credentials silk-screened on them.

The USGA likes it that way.

“We take public safety seriously … but what you see is really 30% of the work of every public safety official at the championship,” Danny Sink, USGA’s senior director of U.S. Open championships, told TribLive.

“Our public safety work, we like to compare it to an iceberg. What you don’t see is the biggest part of it.”

A lot has changed in public safety since the U.S. Open last came in 2016 to this challenging, century-old course set 12 miles northeast of Downtown Pittsburgh.

The prevalence of body-worn cameras and drones among local law enforcement has exploded. The adoption of gunshot detection systems and AI-powered investigative tools are helping to change the details, if not the landscape, for many cops walking the beat.

And, as disruptors’ efforts continue to become more sophisticated, federal authorities remain a large part of the public safety equation, collaborating with municipal police forces to keep a lid on potential threats.

“There’s going to be enough police there that, if you try to pull something, it would be suicidal,” Plum Mayor Harry Schlegel told TribLive with a laugh.

USGA officials are not showing their cards about all that’s planned for Oakmont Country Club. They declined to discuss specific schedules or shifts, manpower and other logistics with TribLive, citing the need to preserve public safety.

Schlegel stressed, however, that Plum police will not ignore borough residents in favor of the U.S. Open. All police shifts next week will be regularly staffed, with the same number of officers slated to work as any other weekday.

Plum police Detective Joseph Little, the spokesman for his 29-officer force and the much-anticipated seven-day event’s deputy incident commander, has remained tight-lipped about further details. He has deferred all questions to the USGA.

USGA officials like Sink, in the meantime, are focusing on the broad strokes.

Cadres of officers, including scores of Pennsylvania State Police troopers, complemented by Allegheny County Police and officers from about 10 municipal forces, plan to discreetly guard and patrol the grounds — and be as unobtrusive as possible, Sink said.

Dozens more will lead security screenings, direct traffic and help with parking problems, aid buses shuttling golf fans to and from the event, and troubleshoot incidents on-site as they arise, he said.

“When you talk about public safety at any of our championships, it’s a collaboration,” Sink said. “Nobody can do this on their own.”

And, yes, for those wondering: police and local leaders have plans for parking and traffic.

Police have provided placards so residents who live closest to the country club — in Plum alone, that includes more than 200 households on a dozen roadways — can still park on the street, officials have said.

Any nonresident who parks on the street will be towed, officials said.

Oakmont police will focus almost exclusively on traffic and parking enforcement within the borough’s limits, Chief Michael J. Ford said. State police will handle the bulk of the work on Hulton Road.

“Oakmont is open, and there are no roads closed,” Ford said. “The businesses are open, and there will be no restrictions on entering Oakmont in any way.”

Heavy crowds are expected next week — somewhere in the neighborhood of 200,000 people over seven days, officials said.

Many of those fans will arrive via coach buses, about 130 of which will run “continuously” each day, shuttling Open attendees to and from parking lots at Hartwood Acres and Monroeville Mall, Sink said.

Those planning to trek to the links via ride-share should get ready to walk a little. Uber, Lyft, taxis and limousines only will be allowed to drop passengers at 10th Street Elementary School. That’s about a half-mile walk to championship Gate 5.

Security at the gates also is tighter, Sink and others said. For one, those attending the U.S. Open will not be able to reenter the country club grounds after they leave — unless there’s an emergency.

While restrictions on weapons, explosives and fireworks at the U.S. Open might seem like no-brainers, the USGA said it also will bar those attending from bringing in any food or drinks.

Pets, banners, lounge chairs and electronics including computers, tablets and phones larger than 7 inches are persona non grata at this year’s U.S. Open. So are selfie sticks and noise-producing devices like radios or portable speakers.

Any permitted items need to come on-site in transparent plastic bags worn on the hand or shoulder, the USGA said.

Oakmont Mayor Sophia Facaros has called the borough home for more than 50 years. The U.S. Open, which comes to town once every eight or nine years, has become such a part of the Allegheny Valley’s fabric that the retired high school principal said she doesn’t remember all the details from the first Open she attended.

Facaros, a councilman the last time the U.S. Open descended on the region, has high hopes this year for the small businesses that fill Oakmont’s Allegheny River Boulevard.

“Even though the club is located in Plum, the impact is on Oakmont — Plum doesn’t have the business district Oakmont has,” Facaros told TribLive. “The businesses are excited. Each time the Open comes, it gets bigger.”

Business owner Teresa Stitt, whose Allegheny River Boulevard embroidery shop has operated in the heart of Oakmont’s business district for 15 years, isn’t worried about local police being overwhelmed by crowds.

When the U.S. Open came to town in 2016, Stitt said, she walked from her borough home to Allegheny River Boulevard. She feared the traffic headaches she recalled from earlier U.S. Opens, when myriad cars and trucks would get backed up over the Hulton Bridge and down to the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

That didn’t happen in 2016.

“Typically, it is very quiet,” said Stitt, 63, who moved to Oakmont 40 years ago. “We really don’t have any idea of what this year will bring.”

“I do have a nice, big driveway, though,” she added, laughing, “if anybody needs a place to park.”

Schlegel, Plum’s mayor, said he’s confident in what has been put in place to keep those attending the U.S. Open, as well as those living and working around it and despite it, safe.

There is only one thing officials cannot quite script or plan out, Schlegel said.

“We can’t control the weather,” he said. “But everything else is highly controlled. I think it’s going to be extremely safe.”