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SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
A group of thieves and vandals are stealing and destroying election signs - and at least one candidate says he is getting fed up.

Close to 30 stolen election signs were recovered from the Sand Pits over the past weekend. - photo courtesy of Tim Doyle

This past weekend, mayoral candidate Tim Doyle and his team of volunteers tracked down the group of teenagers, via public Facebook posts and photos of the stolen signs, down to the Sand Pits and found close to 30 signs scattered around a party site.

"There was about 10 there from Mark Heyck, about as many for Niels Konge, three from Dan Wong, one from Paul Falvo, one from Linda Bussey, one or two from Phil Moon Son and I only got three of mine back," Doyle said.

This isn't the first time the lawn signs have gone missing, Doyle said. His campaign is missing dozens of them, and the time and money to replace them are taking its toll.

"I was up in Niven Lake ... all the signs I had up, except for one, are all gone," he said.

At close to $25 per lawn sign - and in some cases close to $300 for the larger billboards - it's costing his campaign hundreds if not thousands of dollars, he said.

"I don't know why they are doing it, maybe just for kicks, but they had a whole carload of them, and it hurts all of us financially," Doyle said.

Doyle and his team retrieved the stolen signs and brought them back to his campaign headquarters.

"I called Mark (Heyck) and Paul (Falvo) personally and said, 'I have your signs here,' and we delivered them as best as we could," Doyle said.

"The last thing I wanted was to have my campaign headquarters with all their signs in it, and for somebody to come by and say, 'Look at that,' the minute we had the truck loaded. We set about making sure that we called them."

Konge, a candidate for city council, was also victim to the latest string of thefts, but until Doyle returned his signs, he didn't know how many were stolen.

"I knew a lot had gone missing, but not to the extent that I had found out about," Konge said.

"It's Tim Doyle that deserves all the credit. I think he found everybody's signs. It says a lot about his character."

Doyle and his team have decided not to press charges, but are in discussions with the RCMP to ensure that the signs remain where they are placed.

"I'm not interested in making life harder for kids. There's lots of good kids in this community, it's just a small group of bad apples that are running wild," Doyle said.

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