Secret Service Meet with City Council to Discuss RNC Safety

by Michelle Faust

The U.S. Secret Service briefed the Cleveland City Council's Safety Committee Wednesday ahead of the Republican National Convention. The federal agency laid out its plans minus one detail: the map of the "hard zone."

The exact perimeter of the high security zone around Quicken Loans arena will not be released until about 10 days before the RNC.  That was the first thing the Secret Service told city council.

Ronald Rowe is in charge of the federal agency's RNC preparation. For now, he says they're meeting with downtown business owners who might be inside the secure zone to make sure they can still make a profit.

"What are the hours of this? What is it going to entail? And we wanted to address all of those challenges and concerns now, while we have the time, and not be addressing them on July 15th or July 16th," says Rowe.

He also applauded the work of the Cleveland Police Department to prepare for the convention.

"The RNC will come and it will leave town, but the training the coordination, the procedures, the planning, that will have a service life of its own long after the RNC and the Secret Service leaves town," says Rowe.

CPD will handle security for all other parts of the city outside the secure zone with help from officers from around the country.