Travis County Commissioners Court
Tuesday, June 29, 2010,
Item 3
3. Receive staff briefing on mass gathering permit for aquapalooza on july 9 and 10, 2010 on Lake Travis. Acoustic,.
>> good morning, judge, commissioners,.
>> herschel lee, willie from star flight, lieutenant whitehead, tcso, major willis claire from tcso. We wanted to come to you this morning, tell you the information that we have, hopefully provide you answers for any questions that you have, be able to address any concerns that the public may have regarding this mass gathering permit. We received the application on may 24th of this year. The mass gathering permit is for the aquapalooza signature event on Lake Travis. Proposed dates july 9th and 10th, with july 11th being a rain date. First, i want to tell you a little bit about what is aquapalooza. It was news to me when i first saw it. This basically is a water based event. They are held across the united states every year. But -- but searay is the sponsor, searay boats. For the area that has the largest retail sales that dealer will get signature event for their area. The largest retail sales location was in our area this year, so Lake Travis has been chosen for the aquapalooza signature event. They hire headliner for that event to assist in drawing crowds. This year's headliner is brad paisley. The location is out on a piece of land called calcashu point out in precinct 3. A large stage will be set up on land facing out over the water. There are approximately 16-acres there that are going to be used for this event. On this 16 acres will be a number of vendors, approximately a dozen food vendors, there will be other vendors that will be selling items that are related to this event, souvenirs and things like that. The -- the public access to this event is by water. There will be very, very limited access to the event by land. Basically, it will be property owners only from the area where this land, where the tent and event is going on. The event organizer is placing a grid out in Lake Travis, which will moor approximately 2,000 to 2500 boats. Visitors will be shuttled ashore or they may bring their own personal craft and go ashore to visit the vendor booths during the day. The event planners are saying on the low side 15,000 people in the two days on the high side they are expecting 40,000 people in two days. From the standpoint of planning, from a public service, the unified command system will be used by public service agencies and there is a long list of -- of agencies that have been involved in the planning, but i want to read off my list the -- at least the travis county groups. Travis county sheriff's office, travis county parks, travis county precincts 2 and 3, austin travis county emergency medical services, travis county star flight, travis county emergency management, travis county fire marshal's office, travis county and austin wireless communications, in addition there are four state agencies, four esd's, five local police departments, willco and a private e.m.s. Provider as well as austin travis county health department. We expect access will have a -- aquapalooza will a significant event for those people in retail sales and provide services related to lake events. So at this time if you have questions, specifics, we'll try to address concerns of the court.
>> what type of safety precautions, you have that type of mass gatherings, what kind of safety precautions i guess have been put in place to make sure whatever is going on out there, the safety features are paramount and of course that will be a successful event provided that the safety is in place to make sure of that -- that persons welfare and safety are -- are paramount. What have you basic lil planned i guess -- collaboratively with the -- all of the different agencies that would be overseeing this event?
>> okay, there will be -- the event basically has two aspects. One of them is water, the other is land. There are -- there will be a private e.m.s. Provider that will be there. That is providing e.m.s. In addition austin travis county e.m.s. Plans to stage events, travis county star flight will be -- will be in the area. But -- but there are -- there are approximately 25 volunteer life guards in addition to the paid life guards and the e.m.s. That will be on scene on the water there will be e.m.s. On land with transport units, both land and air available. From the land side. From the law enforcement, i'll ask tcso to address the law enforcement, the safety side of that because they have primarily been the coordinator for that. The -- the food vendors, the travis county fire marshal's office will have a presence there both days, the -- for inspection and the two days of the events as far as fire safety and concerns there. But as far as the law enforcement concerns, i will ask tcso to address how that's been taken care of.
>> good morning. Starting thursday night through sunday morning there will be a law enforcement component on site 24/7, the main events we will be staffed up on the land and on the water. The latest information from the tropical storm or if it's now a hurricane may draw some of our preplanned assets away. We are hoping to get it back in time. But if not we have a contingency plan to still staff the event. More boats on the lake than on a normal holiday weekend to address the issue, as well as officers on the land for the events.
>> obviously if there is an emergency, 911 is what people should call. But there are a lot of property owners around the lake, around this area where it's going to be staged. If there's a non-emergency, is there a contact number.
>> that would be the non-emergency line for the sheriff's office. 974-0845. I have spoken to a lot of the landowners already in the area and addressed their concerns.
>> thank you. With regard to the county emergency response that's going to be available, of course, star flight is essentially a -- a user fee except in the circumstances of ingigency. With regard to the sheriff's office coverage that is taxpayer. Ism thrilled, it's going to be wonderful, i don't anticipate problems. But i'm wondering with regard to our additional staffing and i imagine some overtime involved in it,gy have a very, very robust aquatics law enforcement division. But we will probably be using all of it
>> [laughter]
>> we anticipated early on that this was not something that we thought the county should take the full brunt of. Some of that is being paid for by the -- by the
>> [indiscernible], right? Sail and ski. As an off duty employment type of situation. While we are going to be funding parts of it, it is not the large part of it.
>> glad to hear it.
>> any other questions or comments? Thank you very much.
>> thank you.
>> thank y'all.
>> thank you for working so hard on this.
>>
>> [indiscernible] put quite a number of hours.
>> thank you so much lieutenant whitehead.
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Last Modified:
Tuesday, June 29, 2010 2:35 PM
