What a Grinch: Christmas lights stolen from Metro Vancouver golf course
A thief has stolen Christmas lights and cables from a local golf course, leading to thousands of dollars in replacement costs, just weeks ahead of its big charity fundraiser.
Susan Carlile, general manager of the Tsawwassen Springs Golf Course, says staff were testing out their lights weeks before the course’s annual Festival of Lights, which kicks off soon.
The lights run along the entrance and multiple trees, but Carlile says staff noticed that several trees didn’t light up.
When they looked, they realized why.
Apart from stealing Christmas lights, the thieves also made off with a cable that ran about 300 feet. They also dug up power boxes that had been buried 18 inches deep into the soil.
“It took a lot of time and effort to dig up,” Carlile suspects.
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She says replacing the equipment will cost about $6,000, and another several thousand dollars will go into labour to reinstall and hire security.
Carlile says the costs are “totally unnecessary and very mean of these people to be doing this.”
She adds she suspects the theft occurred during the spring months because the grass was regrowing over the dirt in the area the cables were dug out of.
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Money raised at the Festival of Lights is for the Delta Hospital and Community Health Foundation to purchase a Neoprobe Gamma Detection System.
Carlile says despite the setback, the course will replace the equipment before the festival opens on November 25.
“We’re going to make this event as spectacular as it always is,” she says, but admits the time and effort to replace what is missing is a “great disappointment.”
“People come to Tsawwassen Springs as a result of this festival, thousands of people come to the opening ceremony, thousands come and participate in it… and walk through over 100 Christmas trees.”
The course has been targeted before, according to Carlile.
Two years ago, $3,000 worth of lights were stolen over a period of time, so the course started to purchase strap lights to alleviate the extent of damage in the future.