While local and state law enforcement will have many officers and agents on the ground during fest season in Athens, festgoers can rest assured they will not be watched from above.
The Ohio Investigative Unit, the branch of the state Department of Public Safety responsible for undercover agents who frequent Athens, will not be using the 25-foot surveillance towers, purchased in 2013, during fest season, said Eric Wolf, administrative agent with the unit.
The towers can be made available for local law-enforcement agencies when requested, but officials with the Athens Police Department, Ohio University Police Department and Athens County Sheriff’s Office said their respective agencies would not request to use the towers.
“We have places we can go to get a bird’s eye view of things for most of the fests, and we simply don’t find it that useful,” Athens Police Chief Tom Pyle said. “That’s more of a larger crowd, kind of a focused crowd. You could use it at a concert such as Jamboree in the Hills where you can’t really see into the crowd so you have to get overtop of them and see down in.”
Still, Athens County Sheriff Pat Kelly, whose office usually has a presence at #Fest, said his office wouldn’t be using them, either.
When APD patrols during street fests in the city, Pyle said officers have access to the entire fest crowd at the ground level, adding that past experience has proven a bird’s eye view to not be helpful.
“We’ve posted up positions on top of buildings for Halloween and we used to actually get on top of the Hocking Valley Bank for Palmerfest, and you can see right down into the crowd,” Pyle said.
The Oregon-based Flir Systems manufactured the towers, which include four roof-mounted floodlights and five surveillance cameras. The state paid more than $250,000 for two, according to a previous Post article.
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