You can tell that the political season is upon us. On Tuesday, in a brazen daylight act of vandalism, and while I was at home, somebody stole a McCain yard sign from my front yard. I suspect a person or persons belonging to the Hard Core Left Wing of the Democrat Party. Either that or just an angry teenager on their way to Forest Grove High School.

Who benefits from this crime? That is the question of the moment. It could have been a Libertarian, but they favor free speech. It might have been a Republican who wanted a sign for his own yard. No. I suspect it most probably was someone from the opposing party. When someone steals a yard sign, he or she not only commits the crimes of petty theft and trespassing, they commit the much more serious crime of violating my First Amendment right to free expression.

As an additional slap in face, we put up another sign of similar nature back up that night and I sat on the front porch most of the next day to watch over it. In addition, to give me time to catch the thief if I was in another part of the house, I tied it to my front porch with fishing line. But this morning, it was gone again, fishing line and all, during the walk-to-school hour.

You see, this is a much bigger deal than just political warfare, it is another case-in-point of how deprived our neighborhoods are becoming. Our family has lived in Forest Grove over by the high school for almost ten years now. We know almost all our neighbors and everyone looks out for each other as sort of an unofficial neighborhood watch. But through our friendly neighborhood runs two of those connecting paths, one of which leads directly to Thatcher Rd on the way to the Plaid Pantry and downtown Forest grove and the other to a road that is down the street from the high school. Because of these pathways, over the years we have seen an alarming increase of destructive behavior by those traveling back and forth from the store, most of which are kids and teenagers. This summer and continuing now into the fall, it has been at its worse. The vandalism (gang graffiti), theft, littering, raucous after-hours behavior, broken glass and many other problems are at an all time high. And not just in our two walk paths, but throughout all the others in the entire housing development. The broken glass itself has gotten so bad, that we cannot even walk our baby strollers or ride bikes without popping tires.

Frankly our neighborhood has had enough and we are petitioning the city to having these walk paths removed. We have contacted the police and all the city officials, been collecting signatures for a petition and have a lengthy list of police report numbers and incidents as evidence of the need for these to be removed. Te recent sign thefts only adds to it. We know that this will not completely eradicate all the problems, but at least it will take most of it out of our neighborhoods and help somewhat. Forest Grove prides itself on having a reputation as "a safe place to live, work, learn and visit," but if things are left as they are, it will only continue to get worse in this little town overshadowed by Hillsboro and soon Forest Grove will no longer have that reputation.

Please, help us in our plea to change things for the good while we can by giving our little town some media attention and encouraging our city officials to take action. You can contact our Mayor, Richard Kidd or our City Manager, Michael Sykes at 503-992-3234.

Jonathan and Wynter Kaiser