When POTUS Is Among Us

Maybe President Obama should move to New York. A guy with a knife can jump the White House fence, sprint across the lawn and get all the way to the East Room before anyone stops him? In New York last week, as I can attest, this guy with a dog couldn’t walk down the street in his own neighborhood because Mr. Obama happened to be in the vicinity.

How do I know the president was on the Upper West Side? The rooftop snipers were a giveaway.

Sharpshooters were only one sign that POTUS was among us, for a fundraiser at the home—as I later learned from three people in the building—of a private-equity investor who lives in the Eldorado co-op on Central Park West.

The streets surrounding the turreted building were blocked off, with sand-filled sanitation trucks parked at both ends. Rows of blue NYPD barriers extended for a 10-block stretch. Helicopters buzzed overhead and fire-department ambulances idled conspicuously nearby. Residents of the Eldorado and nearby apartments were locked down for hours—and instructed not to look out their windows.

The police presence on Columbus Avenue and Central Park West rivaled what you see for the Macy’s Thanksgiving parade, with dozens of cops milling about, neither confirming nor denying the guest of honor’s identity. A couple of people I chatted with verified seeing the president go into the Eldorado, but all I saw was a white tent erected over the building’s West 90th Street entrance, the kind of tent you see during Fashion Week. It was quickly dismantled after the affair was over, around 7:30.

It’s hard to begrudge a presidential security detail, but I remember the days when Bill Clinton would mingle freely whenever he came to New York in the 1990s. I ran beside him twice at the Central Park Reservoir, with Secret Service agents trotting alongside. As maddening as President Obama’s visits to the U.N. can be, with traffic flows stymied to let his motorcade move without interruption, at least those expeditions have an official purpose.

But when you’re told that you can’t walk down your favorite block, and you see what amounts to thousands of dollars and substantial city resources devoted to safeguarding a private cocktail party, that grates. When the event, at one of New York’s poshest apartment houses, is to host someone who never tires of railing against Wall Street fat cats while invoking the goodness of ordinary “folks,” that really adds some steam to your step as you momentarily think of rushing the NYPD sawhorses to stage a one-man protest.

Elected officials have forever combined government business with personal and political agendas. Federal election rules now demand transparency about how funds are allocated, sometimes to the embarrassment of the office-holder. Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu recently returned $33,700 to the U.S. Treasury for improperly billed travel expenses over a 12-year period, chalking it up to “sloppy book keeping.”

Mr. Obama no doubt follows campaign-finance rules that allow portions of his travels to be covered by taxpayers even when larded with fundraising stops because they’re combined with government business. No doubt plenty of offset planning goes into these trips: In New York to address the U.N.? A perfect chance to schmooze heavy-hitter donors. Thus can the sizable outlay for police, copters, SUVs and the rest be picked up by the public tab—or in presidential parlance, by us folks.

In the private sector, shareholders and the Securities and Exchange Commission have become tough-minded about how executives mingle personal and company perks. Many public companies now report their CEO’s usage of corporate aircraft as a percentage of compensation. I’d wager that some of those attending the Eldorado soirée have had to reimburse their businesses for certain flights and other off-the-clock activities.

Air Force One reportedly costs $211,000 per hour of flight, but neither the White House nor the Democratic National Committee is required by law to disclose how they apportion that expense if a fundraiser overlaps with presidential business. Maybe Congress should look into that gray area.

Costs aside, what is the point of such an extreme show of force for an unscheduled, nonpublic event that announces itself precisely because of the elaborate SWAT-team apparatus? In the world of high-level personal security, such a display seems counterproductive.

Or maybe the NYPD just likes to flex its muscle when Mr. Obama is in town: You want security? We’ll show you security.

On second thought, the president shouldn’t move here—a few days of paralyzed streets and neighborhoods is about all we can take. But as Mr. Obama contemplates what to do about porous White House security, he might want to think about hiring a few New York cops when he’s at home.

Mr. Ripp runs a press-relations firm in New York.