Spring Prowl: The Block Party That Could’ve Been

UW-Milwaukee students rallied together via social media this past month to attempt to bring a block party, Spring Prowl, to Milwaukee. Intended to be a smaller version of Madison’s annual block party Mifflin, Spring Prowl was planned to be on Saturday, May 7 on the 2900 block of Maryland Avenue from the hours of 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. The event would move towards Bradford Beach later in the day.

UWM sophomore Adam “Shaq” Gruett proposed the idea of Spring Prowl. Gruett approached Student Association (SA) for a sponsorship for Spring Prowl. However, after attending an SA Senate meeting where he pitched the idea to them, they unanimously chose not to approve it.

Gruett says a campus-wide event like this would bring students together and expand the social sphere at UWM, as well as bolster students’ school spirit. Milwaukee and UWM police would be present to facilitate the event, and drinking would be optional for those of age. He also believes Spring Prowl could help with retaining students at UWM and reduce the transfer rate.

“UWM is like a glorified community college,” Gruett said. “There’s so many commuters, students that leave after a year, and students that leave every weekend, and we have no school spirit because of it.”

In his quest for garnering support for his proposal, Gruett started a petition for residents on the 2900 block of Maryland Avenue to sign for the event to occur. He managed to acquire over 130 signatures; nearly every resident on the block approved of the idea. He also began a Facebook group to express his idea to the student body; over 1,800 UWM students joined the group in favor of Spring Prowl.

SA President Mike Sportiello says that while the intentions of Spring Prowl are genuine, it is ultimately a recipe for a number of safety risks to occur, including underage drinking and sexual assault.

“SA cannot sponsor an event that could potentially turn into a drinking fest,” Sportiello said. “We work to make sure our events on campus are safe and all-inclusive, and we can’t condone something that jeopardizes that.”

“The events we have now don’t help the school like they could,” Gruett said. “We don’t have football games or anything like that. We need something like this to show incoming freshmen and students from other schools that Milwaukee is the place to be.”

UWM sophomore and campus ambassador Jordan Kellogg also says there would be merit to bringing Spring Prowl to campus.

“I think besides Pantherfest, there’s nothing that really brings our whole school together,” Kellogg said. “A lot of people don’t realize the great things UWM could be and I want more people to see that.”

Although Gruett did not intend for Spring Prowl to become a drinking fest, he says the event would be whatever students’ ideas are to have a good time. He had hoped to have games of bean bag toss, a bouncy house, outdoor grill-outs, music and dancing as part of the block party. Once the event would be moved to the beach, students would participate in volleyball tournaments.

“A lot of schools in the UW system are well known by their block parties. La Crosse has October, Whitewater has Spring Splash, and Madison has Mifflin,” Kellogg said. “Some schools even get musical artists to perform; who knows what we could make of it.”

While Sportiello acknowledges that a block party would break barriers between students on campus and has the potential to be fun, SA refuses to host an event where alcohol would openly be present.

“If we were to sponsor Spring Prowl, it would have to be alcohol free,” Sportiello said. “Otherwise Adam would need to ask a different student body to market it.”

Gruett has not given up hope yet. He has reached out to Wisconsin Red, a private company that sponsors UW-Whitewater’s Spring Splash every year, to sponsor Spring Prowl for 2017. This would allow him to acquire permits from the city of Milwaukee to host the event.

For transportation from the block party to the beach, Gruett plans on arranging for housing shuttles or discount Uber rides that students could take to and from. He has opted to host the block party on a different street from Maryland Avenue in order to not conflict with Milwaukee bus routes.

Gruett plans on collaborating with a number of associations, as well as the UWM and Milwaukee police departments, to guarantee that the event will be as safe as possible.