AMHERST — Police were called Saturday afternoon to Puffer’s Pond for a report that more than a dozen college-aged people were sunbathing on the dam and using the cliff to dive into the water more than 20 feet below.
It was the second consecutive weekend that police were called to respond to potentially dangerous activities at the pond.
Conservation Department employees Jordan Esiason, 21, and Isaac Wright, 20, were responsible for monitoring Puffer’s Pond on Saturday.
The pair said they typically ask sunbathers to get off the dam, which is 32 feet tall, before calling police.
“We try to avoid it,” Esiason said. “We know they (the police) have other stuff to do.”
But when visitors do not oblige, they must call authorities. The pair said they make at least two calls to police a day on weekends when the weather is hot.
“There’s not much else we can do,” Wright said.
They said the people on the dam were “goofing around” and brought blow-up flotation devices with them.
The area is marked with no-trespassing signs, but police have determined that the fences and orange signs are not sufficient to deter people from climbing the cliff and jumping into the pond.
The area was first posted with no-trespassing signs 30 years ago, but budget cuts have reduced the number of town staff monitoring Puffer’s Pond which has no lifeguards.