{"id":142812,"date":"2026-03-19T15:09:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T15:09:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/142812\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T15:09:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T15:09:08","slug":"following-vandalism-donors-help-lights-in-the-parkway-rebuild","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/142812\/","title":{"rendered":"Following vandalism, donors help Lights in the Parkway rebuild"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Following an act of vandalism that destroyed tens of thousands of dollars in displays for Allentown\u2019s popular Lights in the Parkway holiday event, donors and a local nonprofit stepped up to replace the damage in time for next season.<\/p>\n<p>According to a news release from the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mcall.com\/2024\/05\/22\/new-allentown-based-nonprofit-will-expand-and-enhance-citys-acclaimed-parks-system\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">nonprofit Allentown Parknership<\/a>, 107 individual donors and funding from the nonprofit allowed the city to put $20,000 toward a new, 12-by-20-foot display which will read \u201cLighting the Season Together.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhile we were deeply saddened by the vandalism to the event, everyone at the Parknership was heartened by the positive community support. We are grateful to be a part of continuing this tradition,\u201d said Ruffian Tittmann, Parknership executive director, in a written statement.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.mcall.com\/2025\/12\/14\/vandalism-causes-temporary-closure-of-lights-in-the-parkway\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">In December, significant vandalism<\/a> \u2014 including destroyed standing displays, bent light poles and crushed light bulbs\u00a0 \u2014 forced Lights in the Parkway to temporarily close. The popular, annual Allentown event decks a mile of Lehigh Parkway in thousands of holiday-themed lights and displays.<\/p>\n<p>In January,<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mcall.com\/2026\/01\/23\/lights-in-the-parkway-charges\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"> an 18-year-old man and three 17-year-olds<\/a> were charged in connection with the vandalism.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cLights in the Parkway is an Allentown tradition that so many families have enjoyed together. The overwhelming community support reminded us just how much this event means to people,\u201d said Mandy Tolino, director of Allentown Parks and Recreation Department, in a written statement. \u201cWe are grateful to the donors and to The Allentown Parknership for helping us replace the display and ensure the tradition continues for years to come.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Reporter Lindsay Weber can be reached at Liweber@mcall.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Following an act of vandalism that destroyed tens of thousands of dollars in displays for Allentown\u2019s popular Lights&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":142813,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,121,120,433,182,139,28,432],"class_list":["post-142812","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-allentown","tag-allentown","tag-allentown-headlines","tag-allentown-news","tag-lehigh-county","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-pennsylvania","tag-top-stories-tmc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142812","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=142812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/142813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=142812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=142812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=142812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}