This year’s Dillo Day comes after a long series of conversations between administrators, students and Evanston neighbors.

For the past several years, Northwestern and Evanston residents have held “community conversations” each quarter to address conflicts between the city and the University. Problems that arose from last year’s Dillo Day resulted in additional discussion, Dean of Students Burgwell Howard said.

“We have these community conversations to kind of update them on what’s happening at Northwestern,” Howard said. “Since I stepped into the role as the dean of students this summer, essentially following last year’s Dillo Day, the neighbors really wanted to have a series of conversations about issues related to the University.”

He said the meetings provide a means of communication with the University and show NU is invested in having a good relationship with its neighbors.

“They know who at the University they can be in contact with and also get information about what’s going on,” Howard said.

Lucas Artaiz, director of University relations for Mayfest, said this demonstration of concern on the part of students was “tremendously productive” in assuaging neighbors’ concerns over students’ behavior.

The SESP senior said Associated Student Government contributed to the collaboration by rescheduling the ReNUvation community cleanup, which was rained out in April, for the day after Dillo Day. He said the interactions between students and neighbors had been largely positive.

“There’s unfortunately a larger communication gap (between students and neighbors) that we were able to, in part, bridge this year,” Artaiz said.

– ALI ELKIN