A bear was seen near a Worcester elementary school on Tuesday after classes were let out.
Norrback Avenue School notified parents to pick up their children if they were planning to walk home, Worcester Public Schools Daniel O’Brien confirmed with MassLive on Thursday.
The bear was seen at around 2 p.m. in the area of Brooks Street and Malden Street, the Boston Globe reported. Leo Pedone told the Globe that just when everyone says “‘It would never happen in my neighborhood,’ but it did happen in our neighborhood.”
He and his wife Kathy Pedone were coming home from the gym when they saw the bear walking on their property, the Globe wrote. But the bear’s presence should not concern residents until someone is hurt, the couple said.
“For several years now Holden and West Boylston have been developing a lot of land to free up a lot of houses that’s disturbing a lot of the wildlife,” Leo Pedone told the newspaper.
The black bear population has increased since the 1970s, according to the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife. The population within the state is estimated to be more than 4,500 bears, “growing and expanding eastward,” according to MassWildlife.
“Black bears live and breed in Worcester County, northern Middlesex County, and west to the Berkshires. Bears, mostly young males and some breeding females, are living in other eastern Massachusetts communities along Route 495,” the department’s website read. ”Dispersing young bears and wandering males often find themselves east of Route 495.”
