Security Finds More Uses At NFL Games

Dec 22, 2008 12:45 PM

Professional football fans are embracing new text-messaging systems that allow them, in NFL stadiums, to inconspicuously report disorderly neighbors without confronting them, a provocative tactic many of the league's 32 teams are using to enforce the conduct code.

The sweeping attempt to decrease misbehavior in stadiums and parking lots is a "work in progress," says Milt Ahlerich, the NFL's vice president of security. But the initiative, he says, "absolutely is working."

As part of the program, teams are asking the 22.2 million patrons they predict will attend 333 preseason, regular season and playoff games this season to help identify bad apples in the stands.

USA Today reports that fans still are urged to complain to an usher or call a security hotline in the stadium to report unruly behavior. But text-messaging lines — typically advertised on stadium scoreboards and on signs where fans gather — are aimed at allowing tipsters to surreptitiously alert security personnel via cell phone without getting involved with rowdies or missing part of a game.

So far, 29 of the NFL's 32 teams had installed a text-message line or telephone hotline. Ahlerich told USA Today he will "strongly urge" all clubs to have text lines in place for the 2009 season.

"If there's someone around you that's just really ruining your day, now you don't have to sit there in silence," says Jeffrey Miller, the NFL's director of strategic security. "You can do this. It's very easy. It's quick. And you get an immediate response."

Since the start of the 2008 season, fans have sent more than 1,000 text messages complaining about others, Miller says. A few have even texted in photos of misbehaving fans.

"This is about empowering the fans," Ahlerich says. "And getting them to help us, and help security, do their jobs."

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