Leaders looking to make changes after stabbing incident following Sto-Rox football game

STOWE TOWNSHIP, Pa. — The investigation into what happened after a Sto-Rox football game on Friday night is ongoing, and now community leaders are looking to make some changes.

“It’s bad, they are running rampant. It’s scary for our seniors and residents who are afraid to go to the stores and be out at night,” said David Rugh, a Stowe Township Commissioner, concerning the juvenile crime in his community.

PREVIOUS COVERAGE >>> 2 injured in stabbing after Sto-Rox home football game

Stowe Township, like many other areas, has seen an uptick in petty crime up to violence involving the teens of the area.

“For them to be this young and have to have weapons on them is very disturbing to all of us and this is a very good community. We have good people from the head of the school and the police departments. We are trying to do the best we can do,” Rugh said.

But the latest incident has this leadership looking for new ideas. Commissioners told Channel 11 on Friday night following the Sto-Rox Varsity football game just a block from the field in an alley, two girls were stabbed.

“There were some girls fighting, there was a stabbing. It’s my understanding that the girls were hospitalized. To what degree I truly don’t know as we haven’t gotten that far except it did not happen at the school but in the alley across the street,” said Cheryl McDermott who’s a Stowe Township Commissioner.

But McDermott said it did involve some students at the school who were likely at the game even receiving treatment from medics on the field. Because of these close relationships, she wants to work with the district to do more for safety around these events in the future.

“It might be worth it for the district to maybe think about hiring two of our officers unfortunately at an overtime pay but to work with the security people maybe show some more presence,” McDermott said.

She’s not alone. She said the police chief is taking ideas to the superintendent while this investigation is still very much underway.

“Possibly changing the hours of having the games more so during the daylight. My suggestion to him if the school district will listen to him to maybe limit the number of people going to the game. If you eliminate people going to the game maybe it will help to change the outcome of what happened the other night,” McDermott said.

Both commissioners said the churches around the school as well as the district offer a number of programs for kids that they credit as helping, but the big hurdle is getting the kids involved and off the street committing these crimes.

At this point, the district said the home football game start time of 7 p.m. will not change.

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