Township's First National Night Out Gets Thumbs Up

If you ask 20-year crime watch veteran Eleanor Meli, South Whitehall Township’s first National Night Out community celebration at should get a big “thumbs up.”

“I’m having a lot of fun,” Meli said Tuesday night as she finished a piece of red, white and blue cake. “The food is great, but I’m only eating the goodies. They’re delicious.”

The township’s two crime watch groups, Residents Around Dorney Are Reporting (R.A.D.A.R.) and Neighbors Are Reporting Crime (N.A.R.C.) usually hold annual summer picnics but combined with the township this year for the event.

“We’re bringing the community together to meet the police and to meet each other so they can recognize when there are strangers in the area,” said Heather Dubov, the contact for R.A.D.A.R. “The police did a great job, and I know it was a lot of work.”

police officers Jeff Natysyn and Steve Brown, who are the coordinators for the crime watch groups, played a big part in getting the event up and running — although Natysyn is the first to admit that they had a lot of help.

“Let’s put it this way — it’s really a group effort for something like this,” Natysyn said. “One person could never do it. I had a lot of help from my office staff and from the crime watch people. Without their help, we wouldn’t be here. I just hope everybody has a good time.”

Event-goers received a free raffle ticket, literature about township and county government services, and hot dogs, chips, drinks and desserts. 

George Hummel of the Municipal Emergency Response Team (MERT) brought a display of crime prevention gear, including night vision goggles, high-powered weapons, a pepper ball gun and several Remington eyeball cams, round video cameras about the size of a tennis ball that can be rolled down hallways or thrown in windows to give law enforcement personnel an inside view of crime scenes.

“When we call out a SWAT team, this is what we bring along,” Hummel told spectators.

South Whitehall’s K-9 officer Kyle Golden and his German shepherd partner Yankee were on hand, although the weather was a bit too warm for a demonstration of the dog’s prowess. Dorney Park’s mascot Snoopy stopped by for a visit with kids too.

, the national sponsor for National Night Out, donated food, cooking grills and a pair of bicycles as raffle prizes.

“Without Target’s help, we couldn’t have done this,” Natysyn said. “And we had a lot of other businesses locally that helped us out with donations and other things. The community really came together.”

Other sponsors included , , Dan's Camera City, , , , Just Born Inc., PJ Welihan's Pub, PPL Corp., , UTZ Quality Foods, Inc. and . 

Sunny skies and low humidity made the outing a pleasure, event-goers agreed.

“It’s the first time we’ve done this so we didn’t know what to expect," said Police Chief Thomas Toth. "But so far we’re very satisfied.”

Toth credits the bond between the police and the local community with helping to make the event successful.

“We have a good group with the crime watch,” Toth added. “They’re very dedicated. And a lot of the local businesses pitched in. We’re very fortunate to have the support we do in the community."

Forging a strong partnership between police and the community is one of the goals of the National Night Out program. But for Heather Dubov, there’s an even more important goal.

“One of the best outcomes from this event is that the little kids who come get to know the police, and they grow up respecting them,” Dubov said. “These days I think a lot of kids grow up fearing them and this gives them an opportunity to see [police officers] as people to really look up to and not be afraid of. I think that’s a great thing.”

Township leaders are looking forward to making National Night Out a yearly event.

“We got a great turnout,” Commissioner Brad Osborne said. “And we’re hoping for an even better turnout next year.”