While finding a sufficient number of private security agents to monitor future Olympic sites is a headache for the organizers of Paris 2024 and the public authorities, the prefect of the Ile-de-France region, Marc Guillaume , said Thursday, March 30, that his goal is “to have around 15,000 training and recruitments”. At the end of February, only 3,000 of these agents had however been hired and 1,800 were in training, he said during a situation update before the Ile-de-France regional council.
For several weeks, the government has explained that the needs are assessed at 22,000 private security personnel at the height of the event during the summer of 2024, the Organizing Committee for the Olympic and Paralympic Games (Cojop) considering it necessary to have 17,000 agents per day on average. However, the private security sector, which was already faced with a shortage of manpower even before the needs expressed for the Games, is not able to provide as many personnel.
“We are going to call by September the 56,000 job seekers who are in jobs close to private security or who have been job seekers for more than two years”, said Mr. Guillaume. With the regional council, the prefecture seeks “other audiences: students, young people from priority neighborhoods”he added.
Between 140 and 170 boats for the opening ceremony on the Seine
Mr. Guillaume also explained that the opening ceremony of the Games should see between 140 and 170 boats parading on the Seine, carrying 10,000 athletes. Like the number of spectators who will attend this ceremony – the first figures relate to 600,000, the most recent evoke 400,000 –, the number of boats is however also the subject of discussion.
“It’s a huge challenge that will be to get 140 to 170 boats from eastern Paris, on the edge of Ivry, and to get them from the Pont d’Austerlitz to the Trocadero”6 kilometers further west, stated the representative of the State. “When the Greek Boat”first according to Olympic tradition, “will arrive at the Trocadéro, the French boat which will leave last will probably not have left yet”illustrated Mr. Guillaume, emphasizing the “logistical challenge to manage to ensure that the 10,000 athletes can, with the pontoons, get on all these boats in eastern Paris”.