Already, 11 of Read Ready Covington’s signs have been damaged or stolen.

Read Ready Covington ‘word walk’ signs destroyed, removed

COVINGTON, Ky. – A literacy initiative’s efforts to get Covington’s youngest learners off to a better start in their school careers is being hampered by thieves and vandals.

The target? Read Ready Covington’s brightly colored metal “word walk” signs.

Secured to street and telephone poles at eye level (for a child) throughout Covington, each sign features a word and a picture of that word, one for each letter of the alphabet. Five sets of the 26 signs have been mounted, one set each in the Peaselburg, Eastside/Austinburg, Westside/Lewisburg, West Latonia, neighborhoods, and Downtown.

Over the last two years, hundreds of Covington children have “collected” the words on the signs as part of an ongoing word-walk scavenger hunt activity organized by Read Ready Covington.

Slowly, however, vandals and thieves have been destroying or stealing the signs.

A crew from Covington’s Public Works Department recently replaced 11 of the signs, and “we don’t have any replacement signs left,” said Mary Kay Connolly, the initiative’s director.

Connolly thanked Public Works for its efforts and said she is asking that people in the community contact her if they see signs being tampered with or stolen. Recently, a homeowner on Rosina Avenue ran off a thief who appeared to be using one stolen sign to try to pry another off its pole.

“It might seem like a small act of destruction, but the victims here are small children,” she said. “The activity is pretty popular. We’ve passed out some 500 of these booklets, and we often see families out for a walk crossing the signs off their lists.”

If you see anyone tampering with the signs, please call Mary Kay Connolly at (859) 292-2301, or email her at mkconnolly@covingtonky.gov. 

The booklets, available through Read Ready Covington, feature maps where the signs can be found and include writing and drawing activities related to each sign.

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