Kids will need parent or guardian to go to movies at Monroeville Mall on weekends

Beginning last weekend, all children under 18 won’t be able to go to the movies in Monroeville without a parent or legal guardian.

The Cinemark Monroeville Mall and XD, a Monroeville Mall tenant, posted signs around the theater that said the new policy will be in effect March 6.

“No one under the age of 18 permitted in theatre after 6 p.m. on Friday and Saturday unless accompanied by a parent or legal guardian. Parents must stay and watch the same movie with their child at all times after 6 p.m.,” reads the new rule.

A manager at the theater referred all questions to a company spokeswoman, who said the new rule aligns with the mall’s Youth Escort Policy, which was implemented April 2017.

The spokeswoman declined to answer further questions about the movie theater’s policy.

The mall’s policy prohibits children under age 18 to be without a parent or legal guardian over age 21 past 6 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, but can also apply to other nights. The rule applies to any of the mall’s stores, entries, walkways and parking lots.

The Cinemark theater shares the same operating hours as the mall, 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Saturday and noon to 6 p.m. on Sunday.

Stacey Keating, a mall spokeswoman, said the mall’s security team is trained to ask for identification of “anyone who appears to be under the age of 18.”

According to the mall’s policy, those not following the rule can be asked to leave. If they don’t, they could be prosecuted for trespassing.

The Monroeville Mall has been the site of several incidents in recent years, including a shooting Sept. 6 outside the movie theater. Three men were arrested in the shooting.

Five months prior, there was a shooting at Macy’s. A fight in the lower level of the mall grew until someone fired 14 shots at the department store.

No one was injured in the 2019 shootings.

In 2015, three people were shot inside Macy’s as the result of a fight nearby.

Keating said the mall’s implementation was not because of any particular incident.

“It was implemented as a result of feedback from customers, retailers, and members of the community,” she said.

The Monroeville Police Department patrols the entrances for the mall, police Chief Doug Cole said. The mall employs its own security and the Allegheny County Sheriff’s Department provides details at the theater, Cole said.

Cole said the policy has worked at the mall.

“But when (the mall security) would kick people out, (the kids) would go hang out at the theaters. And that wasn’t working,” he said.

The police chief, therefore, hopes the theater’s policy will curb some of the “juvenile activity.”

“Some of it is not criminal, they’re just horsing around and being loud and stuff like that,” Cole said. “This makes it a more family-type atmosphere.”