Someone was less than hospitable when they made off with three hospitality signs from downtown Kinston early in the week.
The signs, which are to encourage residents and visitors to shop and dine at downtown establishments, are a project of Pride of Kinston. Organization director Adrian King noticed a few disappeared around Monday.
“There’s one here (at Queen and King streets), there’s one at the intersection of Caswell and Queen, then I had one at the intersection of Gordon and Herritage, one at the intersection of North and Queen and one at the intersection of Gordon and Queen,” King said.
He continued, “There were five of them. We had them done especially for this purpose. It’s part of an increasingly growing campaign to promote downtown. Then I looked two or three days ago, and three of the five were gone.”
Thinking there might have been a local ordinance the group may have violated by placing the sidewalk signs near crosswalks, King contacted the Kinston Department of Public Safety Assistant Police Chief Annette Boyd and city inspection personnel to see if a city agency was in possession of the signs. He received a “no” on both counts.
KDPS spokesman Woody Spencer said he had not heard of the thefts before receiving a call from The Free Press regarding the matter.
King said the perpetrator is, “Obviously someone with a perverse pleasure in seeing the town stall — I don’t know. I have no reason, no notion of what the motives would be.”
The total cost of the missing signs is $339.06. Only the signs at Queen and King streets, and Queen and Caswell streets, remain.
“As far as last week, they were all here,” King said, adding, “I’m just sort of disappointed.”
Wes Wolfe can be reached at 252-559-1075 or wes.wolfe@kinston.com Follow him on Twitter @WolfeReports.