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Yorktown Police: No Bear Sightings In Almost A Week

YORKTOWN, N.Y. - Yorktown Police said Wednesday there have been no confirmed black bear sightings in Yorktown since last Friday. 

Yorktown Police said Wednesday there have been no reported black bear sightings in nearly a week.

Yorktown Police said Wednesday there have been no reported black bear sightings in nearly a week.

Photo Credit: Courtesy Flickr User Forest Service

Last week an animal control officer was assigned to the Yorktown Heights area  after a few reported sightings of a black bear roaming near local homes. Local residents also reported to The Daily Voice that the bear was seen briefly around homes near Benjamin Franklin Elementary School. But Lt. Kevin Soravilla said Wednesday that there have been no more reported sightings and it's likely the bear has left the area. 

"We haven't had a sighting since Friday," Soravilla said. "The last confirmed report we had was that the bear was near the parkway heading west. He could've gone into the Cortlandt area but we've heard nothing from Cortlandt or Somers about it." 

The NYS Department of Environmental Conservation recently issued a press release cautioning residents on black bear sightings.

"Black bears will take advantage of almost any readily available food source, including bird feeders and garbage," DEC representatives said in the release. "To prevent encounters between bears and humans, people should never intentionally feed bears and should take every precaution to discourage bears from seeking out food sources in neighborhoods and other residential areas."

If black bears become a problem, DEC representatives typically receive requests for relocation but that method is far less effective than changing the enivornment to make it unattractive to the bears, representatives said in the release.

"Once a bear learns to associate certain structures with food, it can become a serious nuisance to people and a threat to itself," according to the release. "If the circumstances that led to the original problem are not corrected, other bears will quickly be attracted to the site and the bear/human conflicts will persist."

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