How suburban police will celebrate National Night Out Bartlett police will mark National Night Out with a picnic in Bartlett Park Tuesday. Mark Welsh | Staff Photographer, 2017
Updated 8/2/2021 7:27 PM
It s one of the more laid-back events of the summer, and it s also the one with the heaviest police presence.
But officers won t be breaking up the party. The men and women in blue are the ones throwing it.
After a pandemic hiatus, National Night Out events return throughout the suburbs Tuesday night with picnics, barbecues, police dog demonstrations and free COVID-19 vaccinations.
The National Association of Town Watch launched the annual observance in the 1980s as an anti-crime campaign to encourage people to flip on their porch lights, lock their doors and mingle with their neighbors and first responders on the first Tuesday in August.