Convicted taggers may have to monitor their graffiti targets
By GREG WELTER – Staff Writer
Article Launched: 08/05/2008 09:57:29 PM PDT
Graffiti artists convicted of felony vandalism may be ordered to monitor and clean up the site they tagged for a year, even if someone else defaces it.
A bill signed into law last week by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger permits judges to impose the community service, in addition to other penalties, regardless of the perpetrator’s age.
If minors convicted of tagging don’t comply with such an order, their parents may be held responsible for the cleanup, under the new law.
Assemblyman Mike Davis, D-Los Angeles, authored the bill to discourage a tendency by taggers in Southern California to put their own graffiti over commissioned murals, considered community enhancements.
He said parole and probation departments will become the logical agencies to supervise the community service sentence, which under most circumstances will only be imposed on those who cause damage exceeding $400.
Even if his department had the personnel to monitor those convicted of vandalism, Butte County Probation Director John Wardell said many are on summary probation, and not under the direct supervision of a probation officer.
Only those on formal probation could be made to comply with the court order, and Wardell said that isn’t realistic given current staffing levels and an impending budget cut.
“The law is a great idea, but it needs to be funded,” he said.
Wardell said his department had a community service program involving minors until earlier this year, but had to give it up due to lack of funding. “It didn’t specifically target graffiti, but it would have been a good fit with this law,” he said.
Wardell said sending out a defendant to clean up graffiti, especially if it involved a minor, would require close supervision to ensure safety.
If such sentences are handed down locally in graffiti cases, Wardell said his department would do its best to enforce compliance.
Davis said his bill also provides for alternate community service to be ordered, where graffiti cleanup isn’t practical.
Carla Thaler Commentary
Governor Schwarzenegger signed this bill while I was attending the 2008 Northern California Graffiti Conference last week. I’ve waited to comment about this news to allow some time to really think about it and make sure I wasn’t having a knee jerk reaction. My opinion is not in line with most of what I’ve read on this subject.
I have a couple of problems with this bill.
- It’s unlikely the vandal will be removing their own graffiti and if so only a limited amount. By the time a vandal is captured and prosecuted it is unlikely that his vandalism is still in place. If it is than either the city is not doing a good job at abatement or the property owner has not had it privately removed.
- Inside knowledge. I am constantly reading forums where the vandals are sharing ideas and experiments in ink, etch, scribes, markers, etc. to find the most staining or damaging. There is an ongoing movement on the side of graffiti advocates to come up with graffiti methods that are more difficult or costly to remove increasing the length of time the vandalism will remain. By giving them access to graffiti removal products and methods we are giving them information that can then be turned against the community.
- Continuing belief that graffiti is no big deal and can be removed by anyone. While it is true that a lot of graffiti can be covered up with some paint with little time or money, very rarely does this bring the surface back to pre-vandalism condition. It takes trained professionals with a range of products to remove graffiti vandalism with minimal remaining damage to the surface the graffiti was on. More signs and surfaces have been further damaged through improper removal techniques or caustic chemicals.
On the other hand I sort of like the one year of responsibility for the site. I know I can’t have both, but hear me out. What intrigues me about this portion is something I experienced several times while running the homeless to work program at Portland Clean & Safe. We would provide formerly (and at times currently) homeless individuals with a job performing maintenance tasks in Downtown Portland. This would include sweeping sidewalks of trash, picking up glass, removing graffiti, and dealing with a variety of bodily wastes.
It never failed that within about a week of starting the program the new guy would come in. They could have been out on the sidewalks creating messes of their own as little as a week before. But here they would be standing in my office saying, “I can’t believe what pigs these people are.” I would tell them that was why we needed hard workers like themselves. You would see a little glimmer of pride in their eyes and their performance would improve. A few times after a worker was unable to battle the barriers to employment I would see them on the street. They would always be the neatest ones on the block with their belongings gathered together and trash going into the nearest can.
My point is that when confronted with cleaning up the effects of behavior they themselves were guilty of they realized that their actions had impacts on others. Perhaps a little bit of time spent cleaning up tags would give the vandals a bit more appreciation of their own actions.
Tags: California, Carla Thaler, graffiti, Graffiti 911, Vandalism
