CENTERBURG – Community members will be able to meet their local sheriff’s deputies on Tuesday at National Night Out, from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Centerburg Elementary School.
This will be the 35th annual National Night Out, which is held nationwide on the first Tuesday of August. The goal is to promote police-civilian partnerships and community togetherness in an effort to make each community a safer place to live.
Knox County Sheriff David Shaffer said this is the third year Knox County has been involved and the first year the event will be hosted by Centerburg.
Fredericktown will host their own National Night Out on the same night, from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. at Fredericktown Square. The Fredericktown Police Department will host the event.
Along with the meet-and-greet between community members and the sheriff’s deputies who typically serve the Centerburg area, local first responders and community officials will also be present. There will also be a cruise-in for classic cars, new generation muscle cars, trucks and motorcycles.
“Trucking Delicious,” a local food truck that offers an array of scratch-made food with natural ingredients, will be present. There will be a DJ playing live music and a 50/50 raffle occurring during the night’s festivities.
Shaffer said the sheriff’s office wanted to hold the event in Centerburg this year to “try to spread it out,” as Fredericktown has hosted it for the last three years. He stressed the importance of events like this in forming a relationship with the community that the office serves.
“The thing that we’re looking for is to promote the community partnership between our neighborhoods, communities, villages and law enforcement,” Shaffer said. “The hope is to give the community a chance to meet their local law enforcement officers in a non-law enforcement setting.”
Shaffer believes that strengthening the bond between the community and law enforcement will allow deputies to be more effective in their service.
“I think it makes us more effective if people are able to interact and have that first meeting with an officer outside of a call-for-service situation – especially the Centerburg officers, who are patrol officers in that area,” Shaffer said.
The Knox County Sheriff’s Office will also promote its services and exchange ideas with the public on how else they might be able to impact the community, Shaffer said.
Shaffer, who began working in local law enforcement in 1985, said that Knox County has always been supportive of its law enforcement officials and that National Night Out showcases that support.
“It lets our officers see that there are people out there who genuinely care about law enforcement,” Shaffer said.
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