The La Grange Area National Night Out on Aug. 4 took place for the first time ever in Countryside.
Several hundred residents gathered at Ideal Elementary School to mingle with police and fire personnel from La Grange, La Grange Park, Western Springs, Countryside and Brookfield.
“It looks like a great turnout on a beautiful night,” La Grange Park Deputy Chief Fran Marrocco said as the night got underway. “Getting our five departments together to put this on is bringing our communities together, it gets us one-on-one with kids and showing them the gentler, kindler side of police officers.”
Marrocco said National Night Out in the greater La Grange area had grown in recent years with the addition of Brookfield.
“When it started it was just us and Western Springs. La Grange and Countryside joined us a couple years ago,” Marrocco said. “We’re really looking to turn it into a big event.”
Chicago had multiple events in various neighborhoods ranging from Soldier Field on the lakefront, Mandrake Park on the South Side, Palmer Park on East 111th Street, and the Far North Side in Rogers Park.
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La Grange Park is in its 22nd year of participating and one of 156 Illinois towns to participate in the event, that grew from being a small neighborhood gathering in suburban Pennsylvania to a national phenomena.
The National Night Out website describes the event as a “community-building campaign” that promotes “police-community partnerships and neighborhood camaraderie.”
In 2020, La Grange Park staged a parade lasting about 2 1/2 hours, drawing about 1,000 people. Because of the pandemic, the night out event was canceled and the parade stood alone as the village’s participation in the national event.
La Grange Park’s National Night Out in 2022 included another 2 1/2 hour parade, drawing about 1,000 people.
La Grange Park’s event earned a Top 15 spot in the nation in its population category in 2017.
Building relationships with the community is one goal of National Night Out. Community feedback is another.
“We do get feedback,” Marrocco said, “and it’s positive. We take some of the suggestions that (residents) give.”
This year’s event had a variety of activities, free hot dogs and ice cream, and a raffle.
Other entities providing information included Helping Hand, the Illinois Tollway, and MADD Illinois, which displayed its watchword, Impaired Driving Ends Here. La Grange Park police Officer Matthew Armenta conducted two demonstrations of the department’s drones.
As this was the first year Countryside had hosted the event, Deputy Chief Jim Stern had his hands full.
“We’ve had a lot of interest from the community organizations that are out here and have attended, so it’s been great,” Stern said. “We get a chance to interact with people in a non-police, non-tense situation. People get to meet some of our officers, see some of the equipment, and we have some great raffle prizes that have been donated by local businesses.”
Among the officers present, a general theme of interacting and building relationships with community members developed.
“It’s interacting with the people in an informal setting and talking to everyone,” said Western Springs police Chief Sean Gilhooley. “Talking to people in an informal setting, because usually in police calls, it’s a volatile situation. Here, people are all at ease and we can talk. It kind of humanizes the badge.”
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“This is phenomenal,” La Grange Park Village President James Discipio said of the turnout. “I’m glad to see our four communities coming together. Brookfield has joined us this year. Look at what we have here, we have a lot of great vendors. It’s a great outing to support our police officers.”
Hank Beckman is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press