Denton City Council made it easier for neighborhood residents to host community parties at a May 19 regular meeting.
Council members approved a one-year pilot program intended to streamline block party applications and reduce costs for neighborhood block parties.
The details
The changes include replacing the tiered pricing system with a $60 flat fee, no longer requiring a professional engineer to provide traffic control barricades and routing noise exemption approval away from City Council. Instead, noise exemption approval will go through the city's parks department.
Mayor Pro Tem Suzi Rumohr said she brought the proposal to city staff after meeting with a resident who said throwing block parties was cost prohibitive.
“This all started because I had a constituent come to me and said that he had started the process of trying to throw a block party and it was going to be about $1,000 just for the barricades and the traffic control plan,” Rumohr said. “I came to staff and said, ‘I’m concerned that we’re accidentally making these really important community building activities financially infeasible.’”
The city defines a block party as a residential gathering or street closure with no more than 200 attendees, restricted to neighborhood residents and not open to the general public.
Looking ahead
The pilot program and new requirements will go into effect June 1, council documents state.
“I would love to see in 6-8 months how many more applications we get,” council member Nick Stevens said.
