The aftermath of San Jose’s postponed Bacon Festival of America is lingering like the post-breakfast aroma in a country kitchen.
Let’s be honest: The city has many more important problems than making sure we can stuff our faces with bacon over Labor Day weekend. But there are some good lessons to be learned from “Bacongate” — as the Bacon Fest organizers have mirthfully dubbed it — about the tangled mess of producing an event in San Jose.
In an item about the festival being postponed until Oct. 15 to 16, I wrote that the delay seemed to be an unforeseen and unintended consequence of the San Jose Police Department’s staffing issues. Ryan Sebastian, whose company Moveable Feast produces the festival, said he was informed the police department didn’t have the available resources to handle the event over the holiday weekend.
Not so fast, says David Vossbrink, spokesman for the city manager’s office.
“The Bacon Festival delay is actually the result of the bacon organizers submitting their completed applications for city permits too late to make the event work for Labor Day weekend,” Vossbrink told me in an email. “Unfortunately, the organizers have chosen to blame SJPD staffing as the cause rather than acknowledging their share of responsibility for the delay.”
And here’s where we get into the complicated process of putting on an event. Applications for special event permits must be submitted no later than 45 days before the first day of an event, though some documents on the city’s website recommend submitting at least 60 to 90 days in advance. That’s because the 17-page application must be reviewed by several city departments, including the Office of Cultural Affairs, Parks, Recreation and Neighborhood Services and the police, before approval.
The San Jose Parks Foundation, which was the nonprofit partner for the Bacon Festival, submitted an application July 9, 57 days before the original festival start date of Sept. 3. Vossbrink acknowledged that an application was submitted in July but said it was incomplete and that a completed application wasn’t turned in until Aug. 9 — 25 days before the festival.
“Three weeks is just not enough time to complete the review, arrange logistics, and schedule staff from many departments, including police and PRNS, for a big event — especially on a holiday weekend that has many events already on the calendar,” Vossbrink said, adding that the city does have a serious police staffing issue and that is part of the need for the long lead time.
The letter of denial from the Parks, Recreation and Neighborhood Services department dated Aug. 16 says, “The San Jose Police Department’s Secondary Employment Unit informed us permits requested for street closures, alcohol sales/distribution along with required police services could not be provided.”
Sebastian’s take is that the application spent that month stuck in the bureaucratic process. He doesn’t blame the police department for its decision because he believes they didn’t see it until August. At this point, he’s just looking forward to putting on a safe event in October at Plaza de Cesar Chavez.
But there have been instances when the 45-day lead time must have been overlooked — and on a holiday weekend. After all, even the most optimistic Sharks fan couldn’t have guessed the team would be in the Stanley Cup Finals six weeks before the puck dropped for Game 1 on May 30. But there still was a daylong event — including a beer garden — that drew thousands of people to Plaza de Cesar Chavez on that Memorial Day Monday.
Were rules bent for the Sharks? Probably. Should they have been for the Bacon Festival? It’s hard to say, as the natures of the two events are different and require different resources. But it seems like there could have been a middle ground. And can anyone imagine that if the police force was staffed the way it should be that there would have been an issue in the first place?
Contact Sal Pizarro at spizarro@mercurynews.com. Follow him at Facebook.com/mercurynews.aroundtown and Twitter.com/spizarro.
