Comment by Michael Armstrong

As organizer of the Bal en Blanc, I am infuriated by reading some of the comments that are making rounds, and that emanate from people who ignore just about everything with regards to the staging this that type of event requires.

The Palais des Congrès is in reality the only viable option for presenting an event of this magnitude. As some people have already mentioned, and they are absolutely right, the legal capacity of a concert hall is not determined solely by its surface area. The number of fire exits and their accessibility, as well as a host of many other factors, all have to be taken into account. Thus, the legal capacity of the central area at the Olympic Stadium is in fact only 7,000 to 8,000 people. The two other rooms (Les Grandes hauteurs) can accommodate a larger crowd (we already presented the event in this particular location when the Palais des Congrès was under renovations) but those rooms are far from offering a comparable quality of environment.

And, what point are you trying to prove with this Hell’s Angels non-sense? Quite frankly, this is really carrying things a bit too far. Bal en Blanc has always made a point of being an inclusive event, open to all without discrimination. How could we change our minds overnight and decide that there are people we do not want to allow on site? If a full-patch member of the Hell’s Angel chooses to buy a ticket and to come to the event, we have no choice but to let him in. If it is anyone’s business to deny him access, it is well and truly that of the police, but rest assured that the Hell’s Angel in question (if he in fact existed) had no option but to go through security and be frisked under the supervision of many police officers. If they did let him in, that was because he was within his rights to come in, like anyone else bearing a ticket. Some of the comments expressed on certain message boards about the Bal en Blanc event and foremost about the organizers reach the limits of defamation and could deserve appropriate legal action if anyone was encline to give this the slightest degree of importance.

As for the long line-up, I state and I repeat, we did not sell a single ticket over the legal capacity previously negotiated with Palais des Congrès, and the City of Montreal Fire Department. The long wait experienced by a number of participants was the result of circumstances beyond our control. We emphasize that those delays were in no way caused by any of the processes that we could control. Ticket check and the cloakroom services ran smoothly throughout the event and those aspects were in no way responsible for the waiting time that occurred. Moreover, additional personnel had been assigned to the coatcheck to make the service as efficient as can be. Nonetheless, despite the fact that we strictly respected the legal capacity allowed to us to do an event at the Palais des Congrès, despite the fact that we reserved two extra rooms this year in order to augment the capacity of the event (one more technical detail: these 2 rooms, located at the end of the Trance Room, were accessible during previous editions, but renting them this year formalized access to the emergency exists that they contain), lines failed to move for quite some time owing to a number of factors.

First, the City of Montreal police decided to carry out much stricter body search procedures than over the previous years. It was only after our repeated complaints that they agreed to allow security agents to skip certain stages of the frisk, thereby speeding up the flow at the entrance. And although those procedures are the subject of detailed negotiations each year, prior to the date of event, we are subjected to the level of contingencies that the police feels appropriate to apply once they get on the premises.

Furthermore, the intervention of the City of Montreal Fire Services also had an effect of interrupting participants’ gaining admission. Once again, the legal capacity of the space we leased is the subject each year of extensive negotiations prior to the date of the event. When the Fire Department representatives arrived on site, they judged that, despite the fact that the designated capacity was fully respected, participants were not spread out evenly enough through the rooms. Those representatives felt that people were too closely packed together on the dancefloors, and this was the reason invoked to stop new participants from coming in. At the time when the negotiations concerning capacity were under way, it goes without saying that the authorities were fully aware that this type of event is first and foremost party-and-dance-oriented.

Although we wish to emphasize that the safety of all participants can never be anything but a number-one priority, the nature of the excuses given in this case leaves us very much conspicuous.

One can only wonder about the degree of determination demonstrated by the authorities each year to undermine the efforts of organizers of such events. and in the process discourage them from staging productions such as Bal en Blanc. At the same time, those services choose to undermine the liberties of all fans of electronic dance music by denying them the existence of a culture and a lifestyle that these fans endorse.

The White Party Week Organization wishes to show its appreciation to all the participants who were wronged by this unforeseen delay to access the venue, and we strongly thank everyone for their patience.