"I've had kids drive up in Mercedes, pull their skateboards out and go skate," Tucci said.

Tucci originally tried to solve the problem by herself. She would yell at the offenders, hoping to drive them away. Her approach didn't work. Now, when she sees skateboards she calls the police. It's just one of the new measures Tucci has implemented to counter such incidents.

At first glance, St. Mary's doesn't appear to be a target for crime. Located on Bean Avenue, the school is in an idyllic neighborhood. But over the last year, St. Mary's—and its nursery school neighbor—have been dealing with a rising vandalism problem.

"Since I've been at the school, we have had to address the issue more," said Kelly Glass, a board member at Los Gatos Parent Nursery School. Glass has been a parent at the school for the past four years.

The problems at both schools started two years ago. At St. Mary's, it was teenagers skating on the roof. At Parent Nursery School, vandals broke into the playground during the summer and stole several tricycles. Police later found some of the tricycles abandoned in front of a local bar.

These types of incidents continued over the next year, occurring most frequently when both schools were out for holidays or summer. Vandals sprayed a rabbit hutch—with its occupant inside—with water over one such break at the nursery school. In a separate incident, individuals rode through wet cement at St. Mary's.

In the past few months, however, both schools have contended with vandalism of a slightly more serious nature. In May, staff at the nursery school found a charred broom on their playground. Evidence indicated the broom had been lit on fire and then doused with water.

"That to me is scary," said Glass. "If it hadn't gone out, we have a big wooden play structure that could have burned down or the school could have burned down."

St. Mary's has also witnessed similarly unsettling acts. The school has recently seen profanity scrawled on its adjoining church property. Just last week, a janitor at the school discovered rocks next to a broken stained-glass window at the church.

Police are taking both crimes seriously.

"We are looking at it differently than random vandalism because the church has been targeted," said Detective Sgt. Mike Barbieri. Although the police department is not currently considering either incident a hate crime, Barbieri said they may do so in the future.

New measures are in place at both schools to deter future incidents. Nursery school board members take turns patrolling the school during the holidays and summer. Most recently, the school bought a new lattice for its fence to prevent anyone from climbing over into the yard.

Still, board members are at a loss for more ways to deal with the problem. The school has looked into purchasing surveillance equipment, but found that solution to be prohibitively expensive.

St. Mary's is in a similar position.

"I don't know what more we can do," Tucci said.

Tucci estimates that such incidents have cost the school more than $100,000. Due to the constant use of its roof by skateboarders, the school had to replace the roof for a price tag of $90,000. The school also replaced its fence—a $3,000 expense—and plans to repaint its graffiti-tagged buildings later this year for an estimated cost of $25,000.

More than the monetary cost of the damage, Tucci is bothered by what the vandalism means for the community.

"It's an increasing lack of respect the kids have for this neighborhood, the lack of respect for property," she said.