Published: September 04, 2008 10:32 pm         

City cracks down on downtown loitering by high school students

The combination of still warm temperatures, sunny skies and idle after-school hours produced a recent spate of loitering in downtown Fayetteville by some students from nearby Fayetteville High School and compelled the city’s police force to crack down on the purported malcontents.

According to Police Chief Pat Tygrett, several business owners in the areas of Maple Avenue and Court Street had complained that kids were congregating outside their establishments and causing an unwelcome obstacle to those entering or exiting those businesses.

The handful or so of youngsters are also said to have been riding bicycles on the sidewalks, smoking while underage, breaking the city’s 10 p.m. curfew and flouting helmet laws for bicyclists under 15 years of age — all of which violate laws that Tygrett plans to start enforcing more aggressively.

“So far, it’s been good the past couple of days,” Tygrett said, crediting an in-school announcement Tuesday by Fayetteville High School principal Mike Pilato with partially curbing the problem. The announcement was made at the request of Fayetteville Mayor Jim Akers, Tygrett added.

“We have elderly people in town. The kids were riding their bikes on the sidewalks or just laying them down. You can’t drive a car on the sidewalk, and you can’t ride a bike, either. It’s the little group that you have everywhere.”

Tygrett said the problem has abated a great deal since Tuesday due to Pilato’s admonition and increased patrols downtown by Tygrett’s officers.

“If we see them loitering around, we just ask them to move on. They still walk downtown and might walk in Ben Franklin or Subway and get something to drink. They end up going out to the park,” Tygrett observed.

He intends to crack down on minors in the form of juvenile petitions if the problem continues or resurfaces.

For those 18 years of age and older, stiffer penalties can be applied, he noted.

— E-mail: mhill

@register-herald.com