SECTOR
Police
CLIENT
Dennis, Mass.
Police Department
GOAL
Assist client in effectively communicating its policy message to a wide audience, achieving its goal of reducing rowdy behavior on the holiday.
Background
Thousands of revels descend on Cape Cod beaches every Fourth of July. In Dennis, recent years saw a troubling trend of partiers creating disturbances, fighting, playing loud music late at night, and getting injured or sick. In 2023, the crowd overwhelmed local law enforcement, which closed the beach mid-afternoon to preserve public safety. The crowd left behind “an extraordinary amount of trash, which included aluminum cans, towels, clothing, shoes, broken glass, broken coolers, beach chairs and contraband.” Over a dozen people were arrested.
Residents called the incident “a disaster” and “disgusting.” The event received negative local and national coverage, causing Dennis significant reputational harm. Further, there was a potential financial threat as the Cape Cod community relies heavily on summer tourism.
The Town’s elected and appointed leaders spent the following months developing new rules and regulations regarding Fourth of July Beach activity. The Town, lacking — as most small towns do — the bandwidth to support a large messaging campaign, turned to JGPR in June 2024, recognizing the need to communicate their plans effectively.
Concept
With just a 30-day window before the holiday, JGPR staff conducted numerous meetings with Town and Police leadership to develop strategies to clearly communicate policy changes. These changes were shared with the media through an embargoed advisory announcing a formal press conference. This advisory included historical information about service calls and arrests.
Following the press conference, the Department released photos from the 2023 response, and videos of fighting, a gun being drawn on an individual, and large crowds at the beaches. This provided TV with B-roll and important additional context about the Town’s actions.
JGPR staff supported elected and appointed officials by assisting with press statements and talking points for the press conference.
Impact
The 2023 incident received 95 media placements across the country. In 2024, the Town of Dennis was mentioned in 110 positive placements, positioning the town and police as proactively addressing a serious matter.
Most notably, Dennis Police arrested 13 people on beaches on the holiday in 2023. In 2024, they arrested zero.
Award-Winning Campaign
JGPR won a Silver Anvil Award in the Most Effective Campaign on a $5,000 to $10,000 Budget category for our work with the Dennis Police Department and the Town of Dennis in 2024. The campaign helped communicate new public safety and parking initiatives at three of Dennis’s beaches on the Fourth of July, addressing a recent surge in large, unruly crowds, fighting, alcohol and drug consumption, and other unsafe behaviors at the family beaches that had widely circulated online as viral YouTube videos. Through a strategic and well-executed communications plan, executed just three weeks prior to the holiday weekend in 2024, our team played a pivotal role in helping to curb these issues by informing the public and media about the Town’s new measures.
Through the multifaceted communications campaign, JGPR successfully secured over 100 media placements locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally. The results included a 75% drop in public safety calls for service year-over-year and zero arrests at the beaches, compared to 13 the previous year.
The Silver Anvil is considered the benchmark of excellence in the public relations industry. It is often called the “Pulitzer Prize of Public Relations.”
In 2025, the Dennis Police Department once again hired the services of JGPR to help communicate this year’s Fourth of July safety measures and regulations to create a Family-Friendly Fourth at all of Dennis’s beaches.
Media Results
From June 19 through July 8, 2024.