Texas to Celebrate National Night Out Tuesday
Monday, October 06, 2008 2:09 PM
Tomorrow night, flip your porch light on and encourage all the neighbors on your block to turn their porch lights on, too.
It's all part of the Texas celebration of National Night Out, the annual "America's Night Out Against Crime" in which front porch vigils, cookouts and neighborhood walks all across Texas will occur as a show of strength against drugs and violence.
Here at METRO, we'll be hosting an anticrime fair in our lobby at 1900 Main St. from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. tomorrow. Come by and see up-close how our Special Operations Response Team (S.O.R.T.) operates, meet our award-winning, very smart K-9 dogs that are trained to apprehend suspects, and step aboard our Mobile Operations Command Center (MOC) and bomb truck.
METRO police officers will also be available to answer any of your questions and to pass out crime prevention literature.
"Our goal is simple - get criminals off the street and keep our neighborhoods safe," said METRO Assistant Police Chief Tim Kelly. "We need the community's help. By joining forces, our fight against crime and drugs is much stronger."
National Night Out began 25 years ago by The National Association of Town Watch (NATW). Last year, National Night Out involved 35.4 million people in 11,310 communities nationwide - and included U.S. territories, Canadian cities and military bases around the world.
National Night Out is sponsored by NATW in partnership with Target, which will also have an exhibit in our lobby.
MPD will participate at the National Night Out event at Discovery Green park across from the George R. Brown Convention Center on Tuesday from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.
While the rest of the nation celebrated National Night out on Aug. 5, Texas is testing out a different date this year - tomorrow, Oct. 7. It was delayed to the fall because of the cooler temperatures now.