Madison’s beloved Mifflin Street Block Party is an annual event whose roots run deep in the politically active and community-centered veins of Madison. The first annual party was steeped in the Vietnam-era climate, and while filled with the radicalism of the times, the Mifflin Street Block Party also featured the sounds of local musicians playing from porches, along with art and other attractions. Now, however, it’s just a bunch of drunk people, empty cups on the ground and arrested partygoers.

As one of the largest block parties in the nation, something seems missing from the event. It continues to attract thousands of people, but despite the recent level of general tameness, police hand out hundreds of tickets.

Some sort of student organization should approach the Mifflin community and offer its sponsorship of the event, so they can apply for permits to reduce the stringency in regulation of the event, while organizing community events to bring some life back to the party with music and art.

Ald. Mike Verveer, District 4, had a similar idea of how future Mifflin parties would operate. He approached the Wisconsin Union Directorate to sponsor the event, not necessarily by asking them to send money to pay police and cage Mifflin in with gates, but by calling on the WUD committees to offer something to help make the party more community- and entertainment-focused.

WUD seemed excited to take part in the event and the Associated Students of Madison even reached for an invitation to help. The Union’s plan to take part in planning Mifflin even inspired discussion within individual WUD committees on how to help.

However, some have speculated that the chagrined university almost certainly intervened and advised that neither WUD nor ASM should be involved in the event and recommended they disassociate themselves as well.

Reacting to the university’s supposed pressure, WUD has said it didn’t have the time or money to adequately sponsor the party, and it voted against sponsoring the event even though some committees had already started brainstorming what they were going to do to for Mifflin. The university should not have stepped in — other than to help coordinate its own efforts toward helping WUD.

As of now, the main organizers are essentially the city of Madison and university police, which means the event is held on their terms, which involve an inordinate amount of tickets and arrests.

In years past, because of more diligent police infiltrating large and loud parties, efforts to harbor a sense of community in the event have been hindered. DJs and bands that want to play on their porch like in the good ol’ days can’t because the police often won’t allow it.

If WUD were to participate in the planning the event, they would be able to make drinking less central to the event while ensuring better safety by mediating between partygoers and policemen with various permits and by creating activities for people to participate in instead of continuing to drink.

The caveat to letting WUD — or any other organization — have a hand in Mifflin is that they can only get involved if they agree to maintain the spirit of Mifflin. If WUD’s parenthood with the Mifflin Street Block Party births another event like Freakfest, students might as well just stay home. Charging tickets to another event on campus that is blocked off with gates, heavily ordinanced and overly policed won’t be fun and will stray completely from what Mifflin is (or at least was) all about. Without community, Mifflin would just be a bunch of out-of-control house parties that are expensive for the hosts, the partygoers and the city.

The reason why Verveer and the Wisconsin Union Directorate should both be praised in their efforts to make this year’s Mifflin better — despite pressure from the university to stay out of it — is because they understand that too much regulation would take away Mifflin’s character.

Patrick Johnson ([email protected]) is a freshman majoring in English and journalism.