MOUNT VERNON – Vandals knocked down and damaged tombstones at the city’s cemetery and set fire to a piece of playground equipment at Harmony Park last weekend, Mount Vernon Public Works Director Tom Hinkle said.
When they returned to work on Monday morning, Cemetery Department employees discovered that approximately 35 tombstones had been knocked over, mainly in the cemetery’s western section, he said.
Sections 2, 3, 11, 12 and 13 were affected, so residents with families buried in those sections might want to check out the condition of those gravesites, he said. However, it would take a lot of research for the department to try to discover if any family members are around or living, so any who are around might want to investigate on their own.
Hinkle said the staff had already picked up and reset all the knocked-down stones. But five of the tombstones were broken. He said the city’s repair company had been notified and would do what they could to repair these.
On Friday, March 3, someone set fire to a piece of playground equipment at Harmony Playground, an act that was caught on camera.
Hinkle said the vandal set the fire on a platform swing, which he described as a larger swing with a bench seat.
“We did get video surveillance of this taking place. We’ve got a picture of this person that we’ve turned over to the police,” he said.
Hinkle said the fire burned a section of the platform approximately 12 inches in diameter. He’s checking to see if it can be repaired or if the platform must be replaced.
