It is almost certain DCNY PRO, the company granted a sponsorship permit for the Mifflin Street Block Party, did not raise enough money to proceed with its plans to construct stages on Mifflin Street and find musical acts to play the event. One of the ideas behind the sponsorship was to reduce the number of arrests, which reached a record number last year, by getting people's minds on a musical act and off alcohol.
Historically, the party represents student protest over myriad issues, but the general focus was on student rebellion. The very first block party in 1969 featured police brutality, and police presence has been met with resentment ever since. Likewise, both the police and the city resent the block party.
Currently, participants freely take pictures with on-duty officers, but the novelty wears off quickly once the officer arrests them for open container. The police stringently enforce laws on underage consumption, noise violations and open containers, which account for the majority of the arrests. Of these three, only underage consumption deserves enforcement.
That stepping from the curb to the street is a black-and-white difference in the eyes of the police is unfair and disgraceful, and the same goes for the ""three doors down"" noise violation policy, where the police can issue noise violations if they can hear noise from a certain house that is beyond three doors away. The number of arrests can be significantly reduced if both policies are outright abolished.
The most reasonable explanation for the vast number of arrests is a money grab on part of the police to make up for the cost of moderating the event, since there are no valid safety concerns; the boundary between city and private property is meaningless considering the size and nature of the party, regardless of what city laws state.
So instead of looking to sponsors as the student saviors to lower arrest numbers, how about taking the police to task for taking a realistic approach to managing the party instead of crashing it.
