If you look at the snapshot of 57 calls for service and 30 citations issued it doesn’t seem like that bad of a week but we are in the midst of a crime spree of sorts. It appears our city is being targeted for the “slashing of tires.” We took our first report last Friday morning and as of Monday morning we were up to a total of 24 vehicles that had been vandalized by having, in most cases, one tire punctured. The locations are all over town with the most recent reports being concentrated at the Lytle Apartments and the Pecan Grove Apartments which are both located on Main St. I haven’t really seen anything like this before; we have had the one night graffiti attacks and the one night multi-theft incidents. To have this occur for several nights in a row is unusual. Fortunately we are starting to get some leads. We have video of a small white, four door car (possibly with ground effects). The vehicle cuts the headlights and pulls up to a house and a passenger exits the back driver side door. A second suspect vehicle, a red SUV, was also seen in the area of the Lytle Apartments, several young males were seen running from/to the vehicle. This must be a group of kids so somebody out there must have some information on who is responsible for this. It’s never too late to do the right thing and come forward. This is the kind of stuff that makes me sick, what would make someone think that doing this is okay, fun or cool?
We only had one arrest and it was for an Atascosa Co. warrant for possession of marijuana, the fellow had a brake light out. Other than our tire slashings we had a report of forged checks passed at Lytle State Bank, a fellow who tried to pass a fake $20 at H.E.B. and a resident of Bruce St. reported that her home was burglarized and the only thing taken was a bowling ball.
It’s official! We (those being served by the City of Lytle Water System) are in stage 1 watering restrictions, so what does that mean? You can only water once a week using sprinklers and you have to water before 10 AM or after 8 AM on your designated day. What’s your designated day? If your address ends in 0 or 1 it’s Monday, 2 or 3 it’s Tuesday, 4 or 5 it’s Wednesday, 6 or 7 it’s Thursday and if ends in 8 or 9 it’s Friday. No use of sprinklers is allowed on Saturday or Sunday. You can water by hand anytime. Some of our residents have their own water wells so they aren’t governed by these restrictions. I have to warn you that our code compliance guy is pretty darn sharp, not much gets by him. I know that he will be out and about looking for violations and educating the public on stage 1 restrictions. Call city hall for the full run down on this, I’m just hitting the high points.
So to sum up my entire report I’ll say “Keep the air in your tires and the water off your yard.”