Every Halloween, thousands cram into the streets of Oakwood for Raleigh’s biggest, ghostliest party — a horde of grade-school witches and vampires that stretches elbow-to-elbow for blocks, so popular that the trick-or-treaters arrive by the bus-load.
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At the center sits Jesse Jones’ house on the corner of Oakwood Avenue and East Street — a locally famous house that transforms into a sprawling haunted mansion populated by life-sized zombies, 20-foot skeletons, a Tyrannosaurus Rex and a deejay spinning scary tunes.
Last year, by Jones’ count, he handed out 6,000 pieces of candy — one ghoul at a time.
But this year, a bureaucratic tangle is threatening Oakwood’s spooky celebration:
To close the streets around the Halloween house, Raleigh is requiring Jones to get a “special event permit,” which involves a $100 application fee, a $250 permit fee and an insurance policy that would cover, Jones said, up to $1 million. All told, he guesses expenses to run into the thousands.
“It’s crazy,” said Jones. “I’m just decorating my yard.”
What concerns both Jones and Oakwood residents most is that a mob of trick-or-treaters will come regardless — even if Jones can’t meet the city’s permit requirements and get streets closed to cars. The event is so widely-known that Jones couldn’t stop it if he wanted to, and he fears for kids’ safety in traffic.
“All these people are coming anyway,” said Matthew Brown, Oakwood resident. “We need to keep them safe. We can’t just keep the streets open with 5,000 kids around.”
Brown said the Society for the Preservation of Historic Oakwood will write a letter to the city, and residents are being urged to send their own. He and others in the neighborhood plan to address the City Council Tuesday.
“This isn’t just for Oakwood,” he added. “Kids come from all over the city.”
From the city’s perspective, Oakwood Halloween has been permitted as a neighborhood block party since 2014, but its numbers have grown significantly.
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The biggest chain, said Raleigh spokeswoman Julia Milstead, is that the event gets advertised to the public through leaflets distributed in other neighborhoods.
“The event draws more than 5,000 people and includes the closure of five blocks,” Milstead said in an email to The N&O. “For comparison, a full Fayetteville Street event closes four blocks plus City Plaza. The closures also take place on heavily trafficked roads and collector streets. Based on the size of the event, how it is advertised, the number of blocks being closed, it has grown beyond what would be considered a neighborhood block party.”
She added that Raleigh continues to work with Jones.
Jones, though, called the current system inadequate for public safety even if he meets all the requirements.
Last year, Jones said, he paid $1,900 for two off-duty officers, but they left when their shift ended at 9 p.m.
“We were forced to call 911 multiple times just to get regular shift officers out to help manage the overwhelming crowd,” he wrote in a letter to Mayor Janet Cowell. “Given that Oakwood hosts the largest concentration of children trick-or-treating in Raleigh at any given time on Halloween, regular shift officers should already be assigned to this area.”
He noted that unlike festivals on Fayetteville Street, this Halloween fun generates no profit for him or anyone in the neighborhood.
“It is hosted,” he wrote, “entirely out of pocket for one singular purpose: to provide a safe, memorable trick-or-treat experience for the children of Raleigh.”
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The council holds a public comment session at 7 p.m. Tuesday in City Hall.
This story was originally published October 12, 2026 at 11:23 AM.