Police buckle down for Calgary Stampede, with 1.5 million attendees expected

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Calgary police are gearing up for The Greatest Outdoor Show on Earth as they prepare for an estimated 1.5 million people to flood the Calgary Stampede grounds over 10 days next month.

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The Stampede, running from July 6-16, is considered a major policing event requiring a significant amount of police resources to handle.

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The need for crowd-control starts off in a big way with the Stampede Parade on the morning of July 7, which police expect will see 300,000 lining city streets. Officers from across units will be deployed for the parade, including traffic and bike teams as well as tactical crews on-hand in case of emergencies.

One challenge with the Stampede is keeping up police presence elsewhere in the city while many officers are needed at high-attendance events, said CPS acting inspector Jean-Francois Dery.

“Our focus is the safety of the patrons and the safety of our attendees, but also maintaining the high-level service to the rest of the City of Calgary during these events,” Dery said.

Dery said this Stampede isn’t the first rodeo for the CPS, which puts together a detailed action plan for the festival each year.

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Some changes are made to those plans year-to-year, however, with focuses this year coming around late-night staffing, as well as working to ensure vendor aren’t over-serving alcohol to attendees.

“Challenges last year were around later in the evening, around closing time, lots of disturbances on the Stampede ground,” Dery said.

“This is an event that’s been hosted for many years, and we’ve been able to learn from our past years.”

Police added they’re prepared for any protests which might occur; in past years, animal-rights advocates have demonstrated against Stampede rodeo events.

jherring@postmedia.com

Twitter: @jasonfherring