NORFOLK — It takes a village to keep neighborhoods safe, city leadership said at the Tuesday’s National Night Out event.
Residents from across Norfolk gathered on the city’s southside at Berkley Park to learn and promote violence prevention and public safety. In the neighborhood and surrounding the park, dance music echoed from the park’s stage ascommunity members bopped together.
National Night Out is a movement that began in the western suburbs of Philadelphia in 1984 and aims to build police-community partnerships and neighborhood camaraderie. Through a network of police departments, the first annual National Night Out involved 2.5 million neighbors across 400 communities in 23 states. The event, scheduled for the first Tuesday in August (or October, in select communities), is now hosted in all fifty states, U.S. territories and military bases across the world.
“National Night Out is all about how we treat each other when we come together,” Norfolk Police Chief Mark Talbot said. “The essence of this night is about building our connections with each other: first, resident-to-resident. A great city is created when residents are connected to each other and then are connected to police.”
This year, 162 communities pledged to hold National Night Out events in the commonwealth, including cities in Hampton Roads. According to the National Night Out official website, the events bring together an estimated 38 million people across 17,000 communities nationwide. At Berkley park, attendees were greeted by representatives from entities across the city and Hampton Roads — from the Commonwealth’s Attorney’s office and sheriff’s office to the Community Emergency Response Team and violence prevention organizations. The police department’s COPsicle truck passed out icy treats as children played basketball on the park’s court.
Danica Royster, representative of Superward 7, said that a “village mindset” is necessary for violence prevention.
“This is what community is about,” Royster said. “This is how we take back the block. We look out for one another. We express interest in one another.”
Bilal Muhammad, community activist and a leader of the Stop the Violence Team, said community members must also hold themselves responsible by working with investigations if they are to see anything suspicious or dangerous in their neighborhoods. Silence, he said, perpetuates violence.
“We just lost our son to gun violence, Ali Kareem Muhammad,” he said. “It’s been 31 days now, and it took a lot for us to be out here today, but my wife and I, we talked about it, and we decided to be here with the community and with family. We must be very vigilant. When you see something, say something. I found out that criminals, murderers, they plan their move and create friction, so that you may leave the scene. When you leave a scene, then they execute. We’ve got to learn how to stay on the scene. We have to learn how to dial 911. We’ve got to learn how to stay right there so the violence does not take place. I’m telling you what I know … It happens all the time. We’ve got to be the policemen for our brothers and our sisters.”
Eliza Noe, [email protected]
