It was a crazy last few weeks for me and Saturday made it all worth it. But at certain points in the day I was not a very happy camper and this message is to apologize for that and explain where my head was at. But first, some background info:
We all paid the SFPD a very handsome fee for certain services. For those of you who know how to do algebra, we paid for 3 officers at a $92/hr rate for what the PD has as a minimum of 4hrs. This was a substantial portion of where our money went. What I wrote to them explicitly, and what Lynn told them, specifically, was that we were to have
• a police escort from Fort Mason to Lombard (and we specified the route)
• traffic and crowd control while shooting at Lombard
• escort to Beach Chalet (since they forced us to have the PD for a 4hr minimum, and we didn’t think we’d only have them for 3 or 3.5 hours up until the end of the shoot, we figured we would use up all our time we paid for)
Somewhere between the day we made our agreement with our contact at the SFPD and the day of the shoot, our requirements fell through the cracks. When the officers arrived at Fort Mason, the guy that seemed to be in charge between the three of them asked what exactly we were doing. I told him what our plan was and as I was talking about how we would rotate the front cars he stopped me and said “you don’t have permission for a street closure… how do you expect to keep tourists out of your shot?” I explained how I had told both the SF Film Commission and the SFPD about what we would do and neither let me know that we needed to apply for s separate street closure permit.
He continued, “what the smart cars did was… blah blah blah… and they were in and out in no time.” I explained that I know what they did, that we had a member present who helped organize that smart car shoot and how we were doing our differently. His total demeanor gave me the impression that he wanted to get us there, take one shot, and leave. I told him that was unacceptable. I actually said the words, “then what are we paying you for? He said, “you’re paying for the safety of your club members and the safety of the general public”
There’s more to the story with that jerk, but the bottom line is that he kinda set the theme for my day, and his and my interactions. (Thankfully, Lynn is a sweet-talker and finally got him to let us do what we wanted, if only 4 cars at a time instead of the 2 that we wanted to do. Thanks to Doug Trigg and Chip Alexander as well, for saying a few things to explain to the officer what would have certainly come out of my mouth very, very badly.)
The plan was then to have SFPD escort us to the restaurant. The officer in charge said that before they leave they had to supervise the tear-down of the jib that our main photographer set up and that we should wait for everyone at Fort Mason. He said that before I leave, I had to sign their paperwork… admin stuff. I signed and he said they had to stay back and make sure we left everything as we found it.
Then Lynn calls and asked where the PD went. I told her, so she called the lead officer. He had is team leave the premises immediately since my signed paperwork “realeased them”. So, we paid for 4hrs of 3 officers time, and we got about 2hrs of “work” and the work we got wasn’t even what was agreed upon. I’m following up with my contact at SFPD once I see the pro shots. If there’s even one car that did not get in the front, I’m going to see about filing a complaint and getting a partial refund. I got bullied by the cops but I’m willing to overlook that if we got the shots we wanted. If we didn’t, then I’ll feel compelled to pursue some sort of correction on their part.
So, that’s the story. After I ate at the Beach Chalet I really started to feel a lot better about things. (I get cranky/punchy when my blood sugar is low.) It especially helped my mood when so many of you said what a great event it was.
I’m glad you all had a good time, despite my mood. I want to apologize to the few of you who saw in my face how I was feeling and took the time to ask if I was okay. I wasn’t feeling very accepting of your concern for me and I feel I may have taken it out on you. It’s not my nature to be like that and that cop really brought out the worst in me.
Thanks, everyone for reading this post, but more importantly, for putting up with the glitches that should have never happened.
On a positive note, preliminary discussions with the photographers sound very positive. They said that they got some really good shots and we should be happy with the results. And man, wasn’t that camera at the end of the jib with the remote monitor at ground level pretty cool?
I want to thank Lynn, Mike and Yolanda/Jack for their help in getting this put together. Without their help I could never have gotten it all done. Thanks, and I owe you each a nice dinner for your time and efforts.
J