Hanover schoolchildren have taken to roaming the streets, haunting local businesses and commandeering the Howe Public Library because there is no place for them to hang out after school.
"There's sports and stuff, but there's not really a place in Hanover where you can go and hang out," said Sarah Schlein, an eighth grader at the Frances C. Richmond Middle School in Hanover, who was spotted roaming the town's streets in a pack of four teenagers for more than two hours yesterday.
Fellow eighth grader and pack member Thomas Kunz said, "We go to J.B. Jammin' or just walk around and buy stuff. Normally we'd go someplace to eat, but there is nowhere really to hang out. The rec center has got air hockey and a pool table, but I do not know if we are allowed to play."
The Hanover Recreation Center on School Street is open until 5 p.m. and offers foosball, air hockey, bumper pool and a television lounge, Assistant Recreation Center Director Chris Zitali said.
But Hanover High School students Alex Reed and Brian Ales said the rec center is not a viable option for them. Ales said it was small and shabby and Reed said it was already patronized by a group of students with whom he is not compatible.
Reed and Ales hang out everyday after school in the Howe library. "It is not a matter of giving us something to do like foosball. We can entertain ourselves," Reed said. "We just need a place where we can be without disruption and act naturally."
Many of the local junior high and high school students have several hours to kill between the time school lets out and the time their working parents pick them up.
"Of the people who hang out here in the library only two live within walking distance of school," Reed said.
The town formed an ad-hoc committee in January to examine existing Hanover after-school programs, research how other local communities handle the after-school hours and advise town selectmen on ways in which local facilities can be improved to accommodate Hanover students.
"The library's problem is just a small part of the committee because it also has a recreation and a school part - determining what the recreation center's role should be, what the school can do and what parents should be doing," Howe Reference Librarian Polly Gould said.
Tamara Raymond, manager of local gift shop J.B. Jammin', said junior high school kids show up in the store every day after school to mill around or buy candy, but she said there are no real problems with them.
"Some times there are 20 kids in here at a time. I try to keep an eye on them, but it is hard when they huddle together," Raymond said. "As long as they are buying things, I do not really mind. They are good about listening if I ask them to leave."
Doug Guyette, a co-owner of the Dirt Cowboy Cafe, said loitering is a problem they are hoping to cut down on, but it is not one unique to Hanover kids.
"You would not go into EBAs without a waitress coming up to take your order," he said. "We're really the only place on Main Street where you can sit down and feel you're not expected to order. And we're not the Howe library, where you can just come in and study."
Guyette said management has considered prohibiting smoking to reduce the number of people who come in just to smoke and socialize.
"Some kids hang out in the Dirt Cowboy, but I don't like it. You can see the air in there," Ales said.
