Jackson rolls out the dough and pulls out all the stops for Humor & Harmony

The city of Shreveport continues to bask in the glow of the recent Humor & Harmony Festival, a four-day event hosted by Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson and his G-Unit Studios that drew thousands to downtown Shreveport, including Mayor Tom Arceneaux and his administration.

“The weekend was fabulous,” Arceneaux said, sitting in his office a few days after the festival. “A very successful event. Huge event. Really like two Independence Bowls, a Mardi Gras parade and the Red River Revel all going on at the same time.”

The weekend included concerts at Municipal Auditorium, a celebrity basketball tournament at the former Stageworks, a car show at the Shreveport Convention Center and events in the Red River District and Festival Plaza.

Leading up to Humor & Harmony, Arceneaux’s administration worked with Jackson to develop a plan for public safety surrounding the festival.

“It went off as well as one might have expected, particularly for the first time we attempted something like this,” Arceneaux said. “I am very proud of our city employees. I am very proud of the cooperation we had from the G-Unit team and also other agencies — the sheriff, the city marshal, parole and probation. We had a lot of help, particularly on public safety. We used all of our technology to great results.”

The collaboration with Jackson was a key component to this success.

“The real significance of it is Mr. Jackson brought all of the money,” Arceneaux said. “When we are accommodating somebody that is putting on a festival like this, and we are providing protection and maintaining security primarily for their benefit and they are paying the bill, that’s a real good template for us.”

Arceneaux said the public safety expenses for Humor & Harmony were divided into two categories: general public safety and public safety related directly to the festival. Jackson and G-Unit Studios are paying for festival-related security, which the mayor estimated at $500,000. He said the city’s expense for general public safety was estimated at $70,000.

“I am confident that will be more than offset by sales tax and hotel/motel tax revenues,” he said.

Arceneaux said he anticipates those revenue figures will be available in September. He also plans for members of his administration to sit down with members of the G-Unit team for a debriefing on the festival.

“They are all off,” he said. “Those meetings will start next week.”

Arceneaux said he was pleased with how smoothly the festival went.

“We had very few incidents,” he said. “We had a little bit of scuffle early Sunday morning because the (Red River) District was completely packed. We had to shut it down. We had to not let anybody else in and ultimately had to move some people out because it was just too crowded. That’s a great problem to have.”

It’s such a good problem that the mayor is interested in looking at ways to resolve the issue.

“I think it proved the entertainment district can be viable, and we ought to look at ways to fill that up and then bring people in to see what we might be able to do and handle,” Arceneaux said.

The festival presented a somewhat unprecedented challenge that everyone involved rose to meet, according to the mayor.

“One of the unique things was a lot of latenight activity,” he said. “We rarely have that. We know now we could handle something like that. It’s not necessarily something I want to have on a regular basis. It does strain our resources because it happens at a time when we are generally short on resources.”

Arceneaux said there are three key factors to consider in the Red River District.

“We probably need to look carefully at management and cohesiveness down there,” he said. “I think we have a new attitude toward it. I think that, in conjunction with the management that’s there and some potential new management, we could really do something with it. I think people saw that, with the right combination of things, people will come. That is something that has been difficult.

“We have to figure out a safety plan. To a certain extent, the more people, the safer it is. And to a certain extent, the more people, the less safe it is. We have to make sure we meet that happy medium where we have the right combination of people and security.”