Too much swearing, drinking and smoking by teens at the skateboard park has garnered the ire and attention of local leaders.
Council voted Monday to have OPP increase patrols around the Fairview Avenue skateboard park. Residents complained the grounds around the field house were littered with alcohol cans, drug paraphernalia and graffiti. A council report also said some teens were guilty of “inappropriate conduct for a public space.”
Dave Cassidy, whose wife runs a fitness business out of the field house, said it’s the same four kids every day. Last weekend he said there were seven teens drinking alcohol in the park at 10 p.m. He called the police but they didn’t show up before the kids left 25 minutes later. When the teens departed they broke the bottles against the building and urinated on the walls.
Cassidy said he didn’t have much faith the police will ever respond to the problem.
“As a police service board member I’ll deal with this,” Mayor Ron McDermott said. “We’ll make it change.”
The council motion proposed meeting with the skateboard community, removing a walkway between the skateboard park and the field house, installing lighting and building a berm on one side of the park to provide seating. The town investigated moving the park to in front of the library by the OPP detachment but it was too expensive and the site was too small.
CAO Russ Phillips said the town has to find a long-term solution for the skateboard park because any relocation requires the pouring of a new concrete pad at a cost of $30,000.
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