FEST'S STATISTICS ARRESTING

Summerfest draws mostly from the Milwaukee area, but 59% of those
taken into custody at the Big Gig are out-of-towners

Though Summerfest draws music lovers from across the country, it's
still primarily a Milwaukee-area event - except when it comes to who
gets arrested.

Of the 298 people arrested at Summerfest through Thursday, 177, or
59%, live outside the five-county Milwaukee metro area, according to
Milwaukee police.

"They may be a little more brazen than some of our local residents,"
said Lt. Anthony Smith, who runs the Summerfest command post. "People
in Milwaukee have a little more familiarity with how we conduct things
around here."

A rash of arrests of local underage drinkers Thursday lessened the
disparity. On that day, 37 of the 46 people arrested were from the
area.

Whether it's the perceived anonymity brought on by the festival's huge
crowds or bravado stemming from one too many beers, some people just
can't help themselves, despite the large police and security presence,
Smith said.

Early in the week, a woman attending from out of state was arrested
while smoking a marijuana-filled cigar.

"She was just walking down the main drag, smoking a blunt," said Lt.
Thomas Welch, who heads the department's undercover vice unit at the
festival. "We were actually on our way to the rocks when we saw her .
. . She shortened our trip."

A friend of the woman's was busted for underage drinking.

Don Smiley, Summerfest president and chief executive officer, said he
doesn't know what to make of the arrest numbers.

"What stands out to me is Milwaukeeans really know how to conduct
themselves, and they're experienced Summerfest patrons," Smiley said.
"As the numbers show, this is not a Milwaukee problem."

Police said the arrest numbers are actually encouraging. Of the
offenses being committed this year, most are for drug possession and
underage drinking. Violent crime has been limited to a handful of
booze-fueled fist fights, most of which have been broken up within
seconds, police said.

"I remember coming down here as a kid. It was a little wild," Smith
said. "It's not like that anymore."

He cited increased planning and cooperation between the department and
Summerfest security. When Smith worked his first Summerfest, there was
little communication, and even animosity, between the two. In the last
decade, that had changed drastically. "It's like one team" now, Smith
said.

Smith juggles the responsibilities of directing traffic through a
construction-riddled Third Ward and ensuring the safety of
Summerfest's thousands of daily visitors, working from the
department's Summerfest command post, a light blue building within
earshot of the Harley-Davidson Roadhouse.

Undercover vice unit officers walking to and from the building are
dressed to make them indistinguishable from the crowd while Chicago
blues blasts nearby.

The building has its own jail and, outside of drug crimes, most people
arrested at Summerfest are processed there.

"I guess, for these 11 days, it's almost like its own little
district," Smith said, adding that during peak attendance officers are
faced with the equivalent of policing the state's fourth largest city.

This year, police have even seen a drop in the festival's oldest crime
trend: smoking marijuana by the boulders that line the lakefront.

"I think there are just fewer marijuana smokers here, and hopefully
that's because word got out because of our enforcement," Welch said.

That enforcement includes uniformed and undercover officers, officers
on horseback and bicycles, and even officers from the department's
harbor unit, scanning the shoreline.

The drop is also due, in part, to changes made while work is being
done on Lakeshore State Park. Some trees and boulders have been
removed and more people are walking by the area, Welch said.