A popular local ghost hunting organization known as the Paranormal Research and Investigation Society of Emerson Valley (PRAISE) has received backlash over a Halloween event they are planning on holding this Tuesday. Their plan is to invite fans for a huge ghost hunting adventure along Long Branch Road, particularly around the portion of the street where numerous people have lost their lives in recent years. They intend to film the event for their YouTube channel, which currently sits at about 46,000 subscribers.

After the event was made public, local residents expressed their dissatisfaction over it. “My mom just died there last year,” said Raymond Wagner, who lost his mother June Wagner in an accident on Long Branch Road last December. “I think it’s in very poor taste, and really offensive to all of us who have lost loved ones in that area.”

A small group of protesters made their way into City Hall to confront Mayor Anthony Faulk about the matter. He met with them for nearly forty minutes, listening to their complaints about the event, but he has not made a public statement concerning it yet.

Speaking to reporters outside of City Hall after the meeting, Geraldine Sanderson told them, “I don’t get why they can’t do their silly little ghostbusters game somewhere else. They can literally play make-believe anywhere else in town and get the same ‘nothing’ results, so why do it in a place that holds a lot of pain for many people?”

Mrs. Sanderson is the granddaughter of Gertrude Wagner, who also died on Long Branch Road in 2019. Gertrude Wagner was the aunt of Robert’s mother June, so the Wagner family has plenty of reason to be upset about the event intruding on a place of such painful memories.

The President of PRAISE, Willow Parker, stated, “We have conducted hundreds of investigations and held many ghost hunting events, so we’re very careful to remain respectful towards the people associated with the sites we choose. We’re aware that there’s been some criticism about our upcoming Halloween event on Long Branch Road, but we didn’t pick it to exploit the recent deaths.

“Our research has uncovered seemingly unconnected deaths in that area stretching all the way back to the 1600s. That’s a pretty significant fact when it comes to paranormal situations. While our hearts go out to the families of the recent victims, it’s our responsibility to shine a light on all the victims who died there—not just the ones in living memory.”

The Gazette has attempted to independently verify the claims of Mrs. Parker, but city records do not appear to contain enough information on other deceased citizens over the last three to four hundred years. If the event is allowed to continue, Mrs. Sanderson intends to coordinate a protest at the site of the current memorial to her grandmother and the other victims.

“I don’t care how many followers their YouTube or Instagram pages have,” she said. “We’ll stand out there from dusk till dawn if we have to. We’ll be so loud and obnoxious that anything the PRAISE people try to record will be completely unusable.”

-Sarah Donovan, Editor & Local News, Emerson Valley Gazette

UPDATE (10/30/2023): Mayor Faulk just issued a statement cancelling the permit acquired by PRAISE for their Halloween event. When we reached out to Mrs. Parker, she said, “I’m really disappointed in the mayor’s decision. We applied for the permit months ago, and it was approved within three days. This seems to be another case where influential bullies are able to run roughshod over the rights of other citizens.”

Although she did not clarify her statement, she was likely referring to the fact that the Wagner family have been longtime members of the Raven Club, a social organization that performs a lot of charity work in town. They maintain a close relationship with City Hall, so Mrs. Parker is presumably speaking about this connection to the local government.