Thieves rolled away with thousands of dollars worth of equipment from construction sites in Mt. Lebanon and Upper St. Clair, police said. The most recent theft was reported Friday from a site at the end of Shenandoah Drive in Upper St. Clair, where a skid loader -- which resembles a small bulldozer -- was taken. Township police Lt. Jim Englert said no cost estimate was immediately available. Between Aug 18 and Aug. 20, a skid loader worth about $15,000 was taken from a construction site along Robb Hollow Road in Mt. Lebanon. Englert said skid loaders are easy to steal because the keys are interchangeable from one machine to another. "So if somebody has one key, they could steal another model," Englert said. Skid loaders can cost $6,000 to $16,000. When told of the theft from the Mt. Lebanon construction site, Englert said he would look into whether the two thefts were related. Also this week, tools were stolen from a construction site at St. Louise de Marillac Church along McMurray Road. Englert said someone used bolt cutters to remove the locks of several tool boxes and also took cooper wiring from the site overnight Aug. 26. No exact figure was available, but the loot would be worth "thousands of dollars," he said. Construction thefts are common in communities where new housing is being built. Bob McCall, director of safety for the Western Pennsylvania Builders Association, said there was a spike in construction site theft in the early 1990s but the association has been working with builders to better secure their sites. "Building sites can be sitting ducks. The hours of occupancy are predictable, you know when people will be there or not there. And everything with the project is in plain sight, there aren't any walls to hide the equipment," McCall said.

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