No National Night Out in Greenville this year?

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July 16, 2012

No National Night Out in Greenville this year?

By BRAD KELLAR CNHI The Herald-Banner Mon Jul 16, 2012, 10:29 AM CDT

GREENVILLE — Neighborhoods in the City of Greenville may not be spending a night out while fighting crime next month, at least not officially.

There is no current plan to host a local National Night Out event, according to Laura Wood, who has organized the activities in Greenville for several years.

“We’ve just been in kind of a limbo,” Wood said, explaining there was a problem trying to decide on a date for the event this year.

The National Night Out is sponsored each year by the National Association of Town Watch to encourage people in neighborhoods across the country to come together and get to know each other, while meeting with law enforcement authorities and learning ways how to prevent crime, drug abuse and violence in their communities.

Traditionally, the National Night Out is conducted on the first Tuesday night in August, although the national organization has allowed Texas to conduct activities on an officially recognized alternative date on the first Tuesday in October.

Greenville has received several awards from the organization in the past, recognizing the city’s event as among the best in the nation for cities with populations of 15,000-49,999.

Up to two dozen neighborhoods had participated during the August dates in the past, but in recent years those numbers had begun to decline to where just over a dozen locations signed up in 2011. Even fewer neighborhoods took part the one year it was held in October.

“August is just too hot for people,” Wood said. “October conflicted with school schedules and it got dark too early.”

Wood and others who had been behind the local observance had decided to conduct an “evaluation period” this year, to try and determine how to proceed in the future. Wood is unaware of any plans by individual neighborhoods to conduct events on their own.

“I don’t know of anything planned yet,” Wood said.