Businesses have a role in National Night Out
Minneapolis / St. Paul Business Journal - by Luther Krueger and Bob Milner
On Aug. 4, 1998, block clubs throughout Minneapolis will host hundreds of parties. Street barricades will rise at intersections as if on cue, kids will be playing in the street now emptied of cars, and barbecues will spit and smoke with hot dogs, brats and burgers. These blocks will be celebrating Minneapolis' 15th Annual National Night Out (coordinated by Community Crime Prevention/
SAFE, a part of the Minneapolis Police Department).
Many business owners and managers may think of this seemingly spontaneous celebration as belonging exclusively to residential blocks. And, indeed, the main focus is to get neighbors to connect with one another, commit to watching out for each other, and practice good crime prevention habits like turning on their outdoor lights from dusk to dawn.
However, a healthy, vibrant city is a city where all of its parts work well together. How well a city serves its people and its people serve it are the keys to its strength, vitality and growth. But a city is not only its government and its citizen residents, it is also made up of all of its resident entities which add to the quality of life in the area. The citizen residents, the neighborhood associations and organizations, the neighborhood businesses, the houses of worship, the downtown hub businesses and the city government are all equal partners in this ongoing experiment that we call a community.
National Night Out helps block clubs to form and nurtures them as they grow. It provides a fixed point in time when neighbors can plan and stage their yearly event or other events and get to know one another better or for the first time. It is in those relationships that the backbone for preventing and containing crime begins. National Night Out is often the center point for the beginning of local community building and crime-fighting initiatives. It is the hub around which many activities turn and
from which many neighborhood activities develop. It's also a good time.
Businesses have always played an important and active role in this celebration. National Night Out is a perfect opportunity for the business community to play an active and visible role with a minimum of investment in any variety of ways. It is a way that their investment can continue to strengthen the community throughout the year by helping to make neighborhoods vital at their basic roots. Many block clubs receive donations of food and door prizes from neighborhood stores, or discounts on materials for fliers and party paraphernalia. Some businesses provide parking-lot space for tables and games for kids. And larger corporations have often hosted parties or sponsored National Night Out with contributions toward printing up fliers, banners, and publicity to help police departments expand their prevention efforts. Some corporations have contributed staff to help with the central planning of National Night Out. There are many and varied ways businesses can and have participated.
Here are examples of the kinds of cooperative NNO efforts that have taken place in Minneapolis:
• Honeywell Corp., Abbott Northwestern Hospital and the Ebenezer Central Campus joined together with a number of south side block clubs to create a huge multi-block party that was staffed in large part by corporate and community volunteers.
• Voss Lighting provided a corporate volunteer to be a part of the National Night Out central Citizen's Planning Committee, wherein strategy and plans are put together for the whole general Minneapolis NNO effort and details are conceived and developed for specific NNO committee-coordinated special events.
Voss also donated product to be used as National Night Out door prizes and awards for outstanding block club efforts.
• Minnegasco provided a corporate volunteer for the Citizen's Planning Committee who became involved in the NNO public relations effort. It also contributed video equipment, a videographer, and video tapes for documenting the downtown National Night Out parade.
• Aerial Communications provided Personal Communication Service (PCS) units and air time for block clubs as recognition for their outstanding NNO block club efforts.
• Paragon Cable hosted a huge block party in North Minneapolis.
• Norwest and TCF made meaningful financial contributions to help the NNO effort.
• The Minneapolis Downtown Council's Security Committee conducts well-attended, informative meetings with businesses, security professionals, and the Police Department reporting on various collaborative efforts. A network of cellular phone/radios for security officers and property managers was established thanks to DTC encouraging the formation of business block clubs. And in 1996 and 1997, the DTC contributed with publicity to make the NNO Parades on the Nicollet Mall a smashing success.
• A SuperAmerica store on Nicollet Avenue and a block club in the Lyndale Neighborhood worked together to deal with "boom cars." The management agreed to decline service to the driver and passengers of any vehicle violating noise ordinances, and the block club lent its support with a flier emphasizing the law and a request to respect the residents' need for peace and quiet. This cooperative effort began while the block club was arranging for donations of hot dogs and pop for their NNO party.
• A myriad of smaller Minneapolis businesses provided items such as door prizes and incentives for block clubs participating in NNO. Food, groceries and tickets for free dinners, shows, movies, and ball games were among their contributions.
By providing the sense that we're all in this together, the business community can become another strand in the fiber that helps to strengthen the overall community and crime prevention links that already have been put in place by CCP/SAFE, Neighborhood Revitalization, and Minneapolis Community Development Agency. A concerted effort with its attendant attention and public exposure can alert more and more of the citizens to the occurrence and importance of this grass-roots nurturing, sustaining and community-building effort.
National Night Out contributes to healthy communications, a sense of connection, creativity, cooperation and collaboration; and these forces exemplify a good dynamic within any enterprise, between its people, within and between departments and divisions. The same dynamic works for the city as a whole and for its many parts.
Minneapolis has done an extraordinary job of involving its local community at the neighborhood and block club level. Its intricate network of block clubs has been examined and applauded by other cities and by The National Association of Town Watch (the national coordinators of NNO) which ranked the overall Minneapolis 1997 effort as No. 2 in the country for cities of more than 250,000. Last year Minneapolis had more than 750 block parties, 1625 blocks involved and 34,500 people participating. "Everyone who participated on every level and at every block party should be very proud of the Minneapolis community spirit and continuing high-caliber effort. There are few cities that rival you," said Matt Peskin, director of NATW.
The National Night Out Citizens Committee is always seeking new and creative ways to work together with the business community to make the Minneapolis effort more effective and far-reaching. There are many ways that business can help the effort: Whether through financial contributions, donations of goods, participating on committees, hosting block clubs or NNO parties, or simply through a "good neighbor" agreement, cooperation between businesses and residents makes for a safer, more livable neighborhood and city. And that is the ultimate goal of National Night Out.
Plan to get involved in National Night Out 1998 and start your plans for your businesses participation in the 1999 NNO effort. For information call 673-3015.
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