Ryan Carter
With high-profile television and film studios on one side of the
city and a busy commuter airport on the other, security in the wake
of Sept. 11, 2001 has changed here.
"The city took action to bring together many critical areas we
thought would be most vulnerable," Assistant City Manager Mary Alvord
said about the ongoing local response after the attacks in New York,
Virginia and Pennsylvania.
Those areas include the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport and the
studios.
Immediately after the East Coast attacks, Burbank Police sent
officers to help Airport Police guard the terminals. City police
continue to work with airport officers.
From Sept. 11 to July 31, the airport paid the city $1.04 million
for the Burbank Police staffing.
"We have always been there to augment Airport Police, and always
been ready and willing to assist, but since Sept. 11 we've found
ourselves stationed at the airport," Police Sgt. Bill Taylor said.
Studio security has also transformed. Participants in NBC studio
tours are now photographed and analyzed by a metal detector. Disney
and Warner Bros. studios have visibly bolstered security at their
entrances.
Before Sept. 11, "our structure was open," said Jim Murphy,
director of security at NBC. "You could walk in from anywhere at any
time in any direction. Now, that's closed."
One big change since the attacks was in employees' willingness to
put up with reinforced security, Murphy said.
"It went from 70% support internally to 100%," Murphy said.
With required IDs, disaster preparedness programs, alarms around
local reservoirs and vulnerability studies, the security of
city-owned structures, personnel and the public has also been
fortified, officials said.
Plus, a new entity has been created to strengthen security issues.
The City Security Council, a group of public safety officials,
continue to regularly meet in private sessions to discuss concerns.
They also evaluate procedures such as the Fire Department's training
of city field crews in handling potential bio-chemical germs. They
are also working to improve HazMat response protocols.
But like Murphy at NBC, police said security and public safety has
been proportional to increased public support.
"We've restricted access a little a more tightly than in the
past," Police Capt. Gordon Bowers said. "But there's been a big
difference in how we're treated by the public in nonenforcement
situations. There's been lots of expressions of appreciation. That
was extremely rare before Sept. 11 and it's not so rare anymore."
