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Let’s put the bite on taggers
But is Asheville’s graffiti crackdown tough enough?
Asheville City Council’s campaign to eradicate the city’s burgeoning downtown graffiti problem is a step in the right direction, but if the initial effort fails, then more stringent measures will need to be taken.
We support council’s crackdown that began July 1. It includes removing grafitti as soon as possible, instituting civil penalties for vandals, in addition to criminal ones, and asking the state General Assembly to toughen criminal graffiti laws, the last of which is making progress in the House.
In the past few years, incidents involving tagging buildings and almost anything else downtown with grafitti have visibly jumped. The situation has gotten so far out of control that visitors, residents and the business community are complaining about the city looking like a war zone.
While we respect Asheville’s flourishing artistic community and the desire of self-expression by individuals within the city, there are appropriate places for graffiti-driven self-expression.
The alternative locations allow for graffiti without damaging private or public property, which costs taxpayers and individual property-owners. In the latter case, the taggers are acting as vandals — not artists.
The city’s study of cases of successfully dealing with grafitti problems elsewhere show that mandating fast action in grafitti removal and imposing tough penalties on taggers are helpful. We think the city is on the right track.
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