Greenville votes to make teen curfew premanent

Greenville City Council has made a teenage curfew permanent after a second reading of the ordinance Monday.

The curfew came about after fighting and disturbances at Falls Park in downtown Greenville.

Police say a fight near Camperdown Way involved more than two thousand people who had not left the annual Fall For Greenville event after it closed at 10 pm and took officers about an hour to handle the situation.

In the past few weeks since the temporary curfew was enacted, only a handful of teens have been cited for staying out late and even parents have stopped dropping their kids off late at night. The number of officers needed downtown on weekends has even dropped from 30 to 10, said Greenville City Police Chief Terri Wilfong.

“This is a tool the chief has asked for,“ said City Council member Susan Reynolds. “To me, this is supporting the chief.“

“We don’t want our children to come down there and get hurt,“ Wilfong said. “So we’d like it to continue because it’s working.“