TAMPA --

The Tampa City Council will take a final vote this week on Mayor Bob Buckhorn's "event zone" proposal aimed at controlling protests at the Republican National Convention.

The temporary ordinance spells out the rules that protesters and other downtown visitors must follow during the week-long convention that starts Aug. 27.

The ordinance creates a system of all-day permits for groups wanting to use city parks for protests and rallies. It also creates a lottery system to reserve parks when two or more groups want the same space at the same time.

Before protesters can claim a park, however, the RNC gets first dibs. The city's planners still are waiting for convention officials to reveal which parks they want and when.

The city's RNC "event zone" rules also include a ban on anything that can be used as a weapon or a shield against police, including sticks, water pistols and gas masks.

Police will get gas masks, however. On the same agenda, the Tampa Police Department wants to buy more than $500,000 in "respiratory protection equipment" to use during the convention. Assistant Police Chief John Bennett declined to say how many devices that would buy.

Bennett said he didn't want to reveal to protesters the extent to which officers would be armed with masks. Some out-of-town officers also may bring their own equipment, he said.

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