PREPARATIONS for this year's Tulip Time Festival are being hampered by continued vandalism to Corbett Gardens in Bowral.
Festival director Vicki Miller is so concerned by groups of youths that roam around the picturesque lawns that she now fears for the safety of people walking through the gardens, even during the day.
In recent weeks she claims youths have desecrated the gardens by deliberately riding bicycles through the flowerbeds and churning up recently planted blooms.
There has also been a spate of petty vandalism with fence posts ripped out, ornamental pots smashed and a trail of beer bottles left strewn across the lawns.
When a council gardener challenged one of the youngsters, Ms Miller said he pulled out a knife followed by the chilling words: "Don't think I don't know how to use it."
The situation has become so bad that Ms Miller now locks the doors to the Tulip Time Festival office when working alone for her own safety and is now seriously considering taking the drastic measure of protecting the flower beds with wire mesh fencing.
She has also written to schools in the Highlands asking teachers to address the issue of vandalism with students in the run-up to this year's festival which will be held between September 21 and October 7.
She said there are two different types of vandalism occurring in the gardens.
"There are the Friday afternoon teenagers who sit in the gardens after school littering the ground with rubbish but we are more concerned by the groups of youths on bikes and skateboards digging up the flowerbeds," Ms Miller said.
"We've also had three terracotta plant pots smashed while posts from the surrounding paling fence keep getting ripped off.
"The gardeners spend the best part of every Monday morning clearing up damage from the weekend and that's a huge waste of their time when they could be busy making preparations for the festival."
Festival organisers met with Wingecarribee Shire Council on Wednesday to discuss their concerns and have written to Bowral Police to ask if officers could carry out regular patrols.
Inspector Michael Toohey from Bowral Police said he was aware of claims that a knife was produced in Corbett Gardens last month but said it was not reported until the following day.
However, he stated that no incident of vandalism at Corbett Gardens has been reported to Police since last year.
Inspector Toohey again stressed how important is was for all incidents to be reported to Police to make them aware of what was happening and to enable them to prioritise the areas policing responses.
"I would welcome any approach from the festival organisers to discuss their concerns and I'm happy to arrange more regular patrols of Corbett Gardens if that is deemed to be a problem area.
"We do carry out regular foot patrols of Corbett Gardens at present," he said.
Email a friend