SAN FRANCISCO, Nov 11: Thousands of foreign dignitaries and nearly two dozen world leaders, including US President Joe Biden, will descend on San Francisco over the next week for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, an annual event that’s being held in the United States for just the third time since APEC’s inception in 1989.
Malaysian Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim will also attend the summit.
Other expected attendees include Chinese President Xi Jinping and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who, along with Biden, plan to discuss trade issues and ideas for economic growth. APEC officially spans from November 11 to 17, but related events and cleanup have already begun, and will continue after the summit.
The conference is an enormous deal for the northern California city – and the world – and city officials clearly recognise as much, evidenced by emails between city officials made public via records requests.
In an email from August, Carla Short, the director of Public Works, described the scope of a city beautification plan to deputy director DiJaida Durden as “similar to the Super Bowl plan,” a reference to when the greater Bay Area hosted the American football championship game in 2015.
In another email, a manager with the city’s Department of Public Works wrote that any time-off requests submitted by department employees for the duration of APEC would be denied. The San Francisco Police Department, too, has said it expects its officers to work overtime as they – along with the US Secret Service – provide security for the summit.
Although the conference starts on Saturday, world leaders aren’t meeting until later in the week, between Wednesday and Friday. Biden is scheduled to land in San Francisco on Tuesday.
On Monday, work will begin to erect three security zones: one around the Fairmont Hotel in Nob Hill, where Biden is expected to stay; one around the Moscone Center; and one around the Exploratorium on the Embarcadero, which will host a party on Nov 15 that Biden and other world leaders are expected to attend.
Detours around the security zones, along with the occasional motorcade, are expected to have significant impacts on traffic as well as bus, cable and rail lines.
All told, the city expects to generate more than US$50 million in revenue from APEC.
However, many business owners operating within the security zones say they don’t expect to see much of that windfall; they worry that customers outside the perimeters will be deterred by the security in place, because pedestrians entering the zones will have to pass through measures such as metal detectors. Business owners are also concerned about a dip in orders through apps like DoorDash and Uber Eats, since delivery drivers will not be allowed into the zones in their vehicles.
Apart from physical changes, the city is attempting a marketing effort intended to serve as a public relations face-lift. Fliers proclaiming that “APEC is going to be EPIC” have appeared on bus shelters throughout the city, and APEC organisers have worked with the city to offer several guides for visitors that highlight local places to eat and drink.
A group of business leaders also started a marketing campaign titled “It All Starts Here” that includes billboards and ads that, as the San Francisco Standard pointed out, very generously associate San Francisco with Apple and Pixar Animation Studios and label it the birthplace of the martini and the waterbed.
–BERNAMA-dpa