Long Beach’s biggest annual party will be safe, secure, officials say, though police department openings are a worry for the union president.
Long Beach’s police officers are going to be even busier than usual this weekend — as the city’s biggest annual event gets underway.
Those plans, he said, “involve the LBPD, the Long Beach Fire Department, our own security contingent and all the others who are involved in that particular process.” First, the Grand Prix isn’t the only event scheduled for the weekend. Just down the way from the Grand Prix’s concourse, pro sailors will gather for the annual Ficker Cup – a regatta that serves as a qualifier for the larger Congressional Cup that will take place the following weekend.Second, and perhaps most importantly, the LBPD’s yearslong decline in its ranks has reached a nadir.
Neither the Grand Prix’s organizers nor the Long Beach Police Department would share specific information about their security plans, including the number of personnel who would monitor the three-day event. While he doesn’t have specific staffing numbers, he said, there would likely be dozens of officers clocking overtime each day during the Grand Prix – with work-hours logging in the hundreds by the time Sunday ends.
The mandatory overtime, though, was also the latest in a series of blows to police morale dating back several years.Chambers became president of the LBPOA in 2019. And each year since then, he said, the Police Department has lost more officers than it’s gained. Advocating for social justice and wanting safe communities are not mutually exclusive, Chambers said. He referenced a 2020 survey the police union conducted that showed a majority of respondents supported both Black Lives Matter and LBPD.
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