Preparing for Bush

A busy week for police getting ready
BY KIM PREDHAM • FREEHOLD BUREAU
MARCH 31, 2008

FREEHOLD TOWNSHIP — Driving to work on March 24, Freehold Township police Capt. Kurt Schriefer was looking forward to a peaceful week.

Police from around the area, K-9 teams and firetrucks converged on the offices of Novadebt Friday to secure the area during the visit by President Bush, who came by helicopter.
(STAFF PHOTOS: MICHAEL SYPNIEWSKI)

There weren't too many drivers on the road, and he remembered feeling relaxed as he drove in.

"I was just hoping for a nice, quiet week," Schriefer recalled Saturday.

But as Schriefer soon learned, his week was about to become anything but peaceful.

A message was waiting for Schriefer when he arrived at work that Monday morning, he recalled. The message said he had to attend a meeting that afternoon at the Monmouth County Prosecutor's Office because a "visiting dignitary" was coming to Freehold Township.

Schriefer invited Lt. Dean Smith along, still with no clue who the dignitary was. But when he and Smith walked into the meeting and saw a room full of men in suits, he knew something was up.

The men — Secret Service agents — told Schriefer President Bush was planning a visit to Novadebt, a credit counseling service on Willowbrook Road in the township. The president would arrive Friday; the initial plan was that he would fly into McGuire Air Force Base and then be driven in by motorcade.

"It just floored me. I couldn't imagine it," Schriefer said. The visit was President Bush's first to Monmouth County. The last time a president came to Monmouth County was in 1996, when Bill Clinton visited Freehold.

The Secret Service agents wanted Freehold Township police to provide protection both at the Novadebt site and along the motorcade's route through the township, Schriefer said.

It would be a major undertaking, Schriefer knew. To get extra help, he reached out to the Monmouth County Emergency Response Team and the police chiefs of surrounding towns. Without telling the officers why, he and Smith also began lining up officers from their own department to work.

Everyone quickly agreed to help as much as they could, Schriefer said. In his department, Schriefer said most officers also chose not to take overtime pay for their work Friday.

When Secret Service then decided instead to fly the president by helicopter directly to Novadebt, he and Smith breathed a sigh of relief. Still a huge job, Schriefer said by comparison making the necessary arrangements were much easier.

Still, Schriefer says he and Smith worked around the clock that week to coordinate the officers involved, which totaled about 40 Freehold Township officers, about 40 officers from the county's emergency response team, between 25 and 30 officers from the surrounding municipalities and several officers from the State Police SWAT team.

Police gathered photographs and maps of the site, picking out areas that needed to be covered and areas that should be shut down that day, Schriefer said. Inner and outer perimeters were established with Secret Service, and the township's fire companies were asked to bring trucks and personnel. Trucks from the companies, as well as from the borough fire department, were set up along Willowbrook Road to block off the landing sites.

Township dump trucks helped cordon off the area, Schriefer said. And employees at the Paragon office complex across the street were asked not to park their vehicles in the lot directly along Willowbrook Road. Police toured the area numerous times during that week, and Schriefer said they reviewed procedures over and over again.

Officers also had to continue preparing for a motorcade, in case the Secret Service changed plans again. "It was a lot of work," Schriefer said with a laugh Saturday.

"like ghosts"

Schriefer and Smith may have been working feverishly last week. But by comparison, local companies also involved said federal agents handled most of the preparations for them.

At Novadebt, chief operating officer Jill Feldman said Secret Service agents were in and out of the building throughout the week but were barely noticeable. Occasionally, they would ask permission for things like setting up equipment or using a conference room.

Besides these minor requests, agents did their job, and Novadebt employees were allowed to do theirs with little interruption, Feldman said.

"They were like ghosts," Feldman said.

Next door at the Asbury Park Press printing plant, Vice President/Production Jack Roth had a similar experience in the days leading up to Bush's arrival.

Roth's first official visit came Tuesday, when he said he met with a member of the Presidential Protection division and a member of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Trenton office. They wanted to use the field running along Willowbrook Road, adjacent to Novadebt and leading into the Press' parking lot, Roth said. The four helicopters in Bush's entourage landed in fields running along either side of the Press driveway.

Besides giving approval to use the field, however, Roth said the Press's involvement boiled down to lining up 11 trucks along the perimeter of the lot as a protection, setting up the lockdown of the Press building for several hours while the president visited and ensuring employees stayed behind the lined up trucks. On Thursday night, Schriefer met with the commanding officers in the township courtroom for a briefing, Schriefer said. He distributed maps and went over their officers' duties for the next day.

bush arrives

Then on Friday, police met again at township police headquarters at 9 a.m. By about 10 a.m., officers were on location and heading to their posts, where — except for breaks — they would remain for the next several hours, Schriefer said.

As the time for the president's visit crept closer, Willowbrook Road was shut down between Wynnewood Drive and Halls Mills Road. Yellow police tape ringed the perimeter of the Paragon office complex's parking lot along Willowbrook Road, and officers stood guard up and down the road.

Around 1:30 p.m., Schriefer said officers were ordered to remain at their posts. Then just before 2:30 p.m., as Schriefer waited in the Secret Service command post, word came over: The President had touched down at McGuire and was now airborne again. He would be at Novadebt in about 15 minutes, Schriefer said.

"You could have heard a pin drop in there," Schriefer recalled.

And then the moment arrived. The president's helicopter landed, he stepped down and — after five days of preparation — entered Novadebt.

Bush met with Novadebt executives and counselors and with homeowners. He shook hands with many of the people he encountered, including a dumbfounded Schriefer.

Then, as quickly as he came, Bush was gone, leaving before his scheduled 4 p.m. departure. Not long after Bush and his entourage disappeared, the mass of police officers and emergency personnel that had crowded the area for so many hours also quickly faded away.

As the choppers left, Schriefer recalled, "I was just so proud of our police department."

And though he kept waiting for something to go wrong, Schriefer said he was amazed that the day went off without any major problems.

"The entire operation went flawlessly," Schriefer said.