Whether you are a group or an individual, you can tackle graffiti in your neighborhood. The City of Seattle supports volunteers with FREE paint (white-brown-gray), rollers, brushes, scrapers, and gloves.

Sign up online, or call 206-684-7790 for more information.

Supplies can be picked up on the following Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. (registration required first): July 16, July 30, Aug. 6, Aug. 20.

“Last week I noticed some red spray paint tags on real estate signs and parking signs near my apartment building (on Taylor Ave, right where it merges with 5th Ave.). Then when I was walking my dog in Trolley Hill Park I came across the saddest sight. Huge amounts of tagging on all the wood tables and benches, and down the entire length of a large tree’s trunk. Things like “Bloods” “Crip Killers” “KKK” and anarchy signs,” she wrote Queen Anne View. “Likely not really anything gang related, probably just some brats with some spray paint. Still SO sad.”

Trolley Hill Park is tucked away on the east side of the hill at 5th N and Blaine Street, and because of this it is more secluded and one of Queen Anne the neighborhood’s lesser known parks. The park includes a natural kids play area, a picnic area with tables and benches, a community P-Patch, and a beautiful view. It was named after one of the main trolley lines leading up Queen Anne Hill , which was in operation from 1890 to 1940.

In all cases of vandalism, officials recommend swift and and thorough action. When vandalism takes place on public property, as in this case, the City of Seattle takes on the responsibility of cleaning it up. Graffiti found on public property can be reported by calling the City of Seattle’s Hotline at (206) 684-7587, or filling out this online report form.

The graffiti at Trolley Hill Park was reported to the city’s response line this morning, and crews will be looking into the incident, though they were not able to provide a definite timeline for when the graffiti would be removed, though the city says that action will be taken in a timely manner.

For graffiti on private property, the city provides a number of resources to help residents respond. If you find vandalism on your property, the city recommends you document the vandalism for insurance purposes and call the Seattle Police Department’s non-emergency number (206) 625-5011 and file a report. If you witness an act of graffiti or vandalism in progress, it is recommended that you call 911, as vandals must be caught in the act to be prosecuted. For more information on what to do about vandalism in the community, check out the city’s resources here and here.

“Property with graffiti that has not been removed in a reasonable amount of time may be subject to fines under the Graffiti Nuisance Ordinance,” according to the Seattle Police Department website.

Though the city will be handling the incident at Trolley Hill Park, Vicki says she’s ready to take some action in the meantime.

“I’m going to head over to the park at 11 a.m. on Saturday to try and do some scrubbing, if anyone wants to help they are more than welcome to join me,” she wrote. “I go to this park every day and its just infuriating to look at.”

Even when city crews tackle public graffiti, they often ask for community volunteers to help them with the clean-up, so Vicki’s efforts are very much welcomed. Get more information on how to organize a Volunteer Graffiti Clean-Up Event here to keep a four-block area in your community graffiti free (Seattle Public Utilities provides the supplies and waiver forms needed for the event), or learn more about taking part in SPU’s Summer Paint Out program in July or August (again, SPU provides free paint  in white, brown or gray, and rollers, brushes, scrapers, and gloves).

Supplies can be picked up at the Seattle Public Utilities warehouse (3633 E Marginal Way S) on the following Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
-July 2
-July 16
-July 30
-August 6
-August 20

In order to receive the supplies, you must register first – use the link, email daniel.sims@seattle.gov or call 206-684-7790.

* Thanks to Vicki for the tip and pictures!

With the help of the nonprofit Common Language Project and communications students at the University of Washington, we take a closer look at the graffiti issue through the eyes of the people tracking it, cleaning it up, and making it.

Continue reading “Redefining Seattle graffiti laws is a sticky issue”

“Let’s hope it remains in good shape and not hit again by graffiti!” Murphy wrote. Murphy also emphasized Seattle Country Day School’s commitment to contributing to the Queen Anne community. He wrote:

Besides the mural and Adopt-a-Street clean-up, SCDS has hopefully been a positive influence in the neighborhood in other ways.  Several of our students have made multiple visits to the nearby Queen Anne Care Center bringing Valentine’s Day gifts, sharing music, and interviewing some residents as part of their history classes.  Also, for several years, our students have regularly been sprucing –up designated areas in Rogers and Mayfair Park under the guidance of the city’s Parks Department.

Vandalism around the neighborhood is nothing new. Read up on the most recent occurrences here.

City Councilmembers Tim Burgess and Tom Rasmussen have asked the Office of City Auditor to review and evaluate the current response to graffiti and then make recommendations to the Mayor and the City Council. As part of the review process, the City Auditor has come up with a ten-question survey asking community members if graffiti (both public and private) is an issue for them, how often their property has been marked with graffiti and what improvements can be made in the city’s graffiti response.

Residents interested in participating may follow this link to the questionnaire, which will be open until Monday, May 10.

Need a review of the graffiti issues citywide? Check out the collaborative project between the Seattle Times and many neighborhood blogs around town.

Speakers and panelists at the forum included representatives from the Seattle Police Department, Seattle Public Utilities, Seattle City Council, as well as community and organizational leaders. Topics covered included public safety, Block Watch programs,  graffiti reporting–a particularly hot issue in Queen Anne right now–and more.

For those who prefer to watch Seattle Channel on the good old fashioned TV, they will be airing repeats of the cablecast at 2 p.m. today, Thursday, April 29 and 2 p.m. tomorrow, Friday, April 30 on Channel 21.

Two months ago Queen Anne residents woke up to find graffiti 15 feet tall sprawled across both walls of Counterbalance Park, at the corner of Queen Anne Ave N and Roy St. The next day Alex Braun, the manager of both buildings adjacent to the park’s walls–The Willis condominiums and the Barclay Court retail building–set to work to wash the paint away.

The first eleven feet of the wall had been sealed, and so the paint easily lifted off the concrete. However, the concrete above the 11-foot mark was unprotected, causing the paint to soak in. It took several weeks before the clean-up was complete and the tag entirely removed.

Although graffiti in any urban environment is not uncommon, the size and nature of this particular incident sparked discussion in the Queen Anne community. Some residents claimed vandalism had increased in recent years, while others said graffiti always had been and always would be part of the neighborhood landscape.

Braun has personally cleaned graffiti off the walls and buildings near Counterbalance Park “countless times” in the 11 years he’s been living and working next to this Lower Queen Anne corner. “It’s always been the same at my building,” he said.

“Last week alone I had–and you have to understand that I also clean up the traffic signs and parking signs that are right outside my building–so those included, last Tuesday I had two big graffities on the building–big like three feet long and a foot wide–and two on signs. So that’s a total of four on Tuesday. And then on Friday morning I had three more, so that’s seven just last week,” he said.

According to Braun, this incident was the second largest he’d ever encountered. The first was back in the early 2000s, and resembled a similar pattern, however this time the lettering was eight feet high and spanned across the entirety of just one of the walls. And though tags of this kind are infrequent, he says in his experience graffiti around the neighborhood has always been prevalent.

“Over the years, quite frankly I’ve lost track of it,” he said. “I only keep track of the really big ones.”

We called Seattle Public Utilities, the department responsible for cleaning up vandalism on public property, to find out if the number of reported incidences had in fact gone up in recent years. After weeks of back and forth, we discovered that SPU does not keep records of the numbers of incidences reported at a given address, in a specific neighborhood or citywide.

“We can give you the last date a report was called in at a specific address,” a SPU representative said. “But that’s it.”

The frequency of incidents citywide means SPU resources are often spread thin, and it is frequently left to the residents–like Braun–to decide how to handle vandalism on both public and private property. Two weekends ago the Uptown Alliance sponsored a graffiti clean-up at Counterbalance Park. Volunteers spent the day painting the top half of the wall, above the 11-foot mark, with primer and another coat of paint to better protect it against a repeat attack.

“The Parks Department could not spend the money to have the wall repainted. So the Parks Department provided us with paint and primer, and then the Uptown Alliance organized a community effort to have those walls painted from the 11-feet up to the very top,” Braun said.

Still, many in the neighborhood disagree over what the best course of action should be. Some suggest the city should hire artists to paint murals over large public walls to deter tagging.

“Personally I think they should open up those walls and allow people to actually put up awesome art. When some of those graffiti guys get time they can make big intricate pieces that would look more unique and interesting than any other city park, especially at night when they were lit up by those lights,” reader Macrus wrote.

However these projects are often targets for even more vandalism, as was the mural at Dexter underpass last year.

“I would not even dignify that aberration by calling it a tag or it’s creator a tagger. He is a petty vandal, through and through,” Rodstewart wrote of the Counterbalance graffiti. “Let’s not kid ourselves here. Real tagging requires planning, skill, technique, and patience.”

After the vandalism of Counterbalance Park, we decided to put the question of how to handle graffiti to the community. Here are some of the responses we got:

Nate wrote,

I frequently take my child to the various parks on top of Queen Anne and am a Queen Anne resident. The playground equipment is nearly always covered in graffiti, sometime vulgar. Stop signs, news paperboxes etc… often have graffiti on them as well. Something needs to be done to clean up the streets, remove this graffiti as soon as it appears and arrest those responsible. Seems we are tolerating it and should not be.

Carol E. wrote,

I am from Chicago, and when I moved to lower Queen Anne I was shocked at the amount of graffiti. In my Chicago neighborhood it gets removed ASAP. The Chicago city council outlawed the sale of spray paint within city limits, which I always thought was ridiculous since they could buy it in the suburbs. But maybe it did make a difference.

Amyalayne wrote,

How about increase funding to the Seattle PD so we can have more patrols in the area? I agree with Carol in that when I lived in CA, graffiti was removed right away and the city just doesn’t seem to care here. In a lot of cases the business owners should also be responsible for cleaning up or coordinating w/the city for removal too. The graffiti has been horrible in the three years I’ve been in lower QA. I think there also needs to be more street lights. There are many dark areas of lower QA (and upper for that matter) that just don’t make it that safe to walk around in anymore. Another idea would be to grow some ivy that covers those walls. If it’s happened once it will happen again I am sure.

Although Braun agrees that this will not be the last time graffiti is seen at Counterbalance Park, he still believes the best way to tackle the tags is to continue to clean or cover them as soon as possible.

“If they tag us again, which I know they will, we’ll just paint over it,” Braun said. “The best thing is to paint over it or remove it, and yes they will come back, but you know, they’re only going to come back two or three times and then that’s it. In my case, with my  building, I noticed that when I first started there we had a lot of graffiti from a lot of famous taggers. And I was right on top of it and just had it removed the day after, as soon as I was able to,”  Braun said.

And as summer approaches, Braun says vandalism will only increase with the warmer weather, when paint sticks more easily. “If you have a rainy cold day, there’s very few taggers out there because they know the paint doesn’t stick very well on a wet surface,” he said.

Still, in the hopes of deterring potential vandals, Braun advises community members continue to remove graffiti as quickly as possible.

“Yes they’re going to come back, but once they see that you’ve removed it, they realize that you’re on top of things and they’re not going to go there anymore because they know that you’ll just erase it–you make their soup sour, which is what they don’t like. It’s been working for me in my building, and I’m going to continue taking them off as soon as they come up,” he said.

A community group called “Neighbors Working Together for a Clean and Safe Queen Anne” has taken a Block Watch approach to deterring vandalism, posting fliers around the neighborhood warning that the area is patrolled by Graffiti Watch Volunteers.

To report vandalism to Seattle Public Utilities, call the graffiti line at 206-684-7587. Get tips on how to prevent and remove graffiti here.

The discussion will cover topics on public safety, Block Watch programs,  graffiti reporting and more, with speakers and representatives from the Seattle Police Department, Seattle Public Utilities, City Council, and a number of community organization.

The forum is a joint effort by the Queen Anne Chamber of Commerce, South Lake Union Chamber of Commerce, Uptown Alliance and Queen Anne Community Council.

More information on the forum tonight here.

Counterbalance Park was vandalized overnight back in February, when both concrete walls of the “urban park” were covered with red lettering almost 15 feet high. Alex Braun, the manager of The Willis condos that border the north wall of the park and the Barclay Court business building to the east, was able to remove the majority of the tags the next day.

However, because the park walls were only sealed up to 11 feet, it took another three weeks and a graffiti specialist to remove the final traces.

On Saturday morning a handful of volunteers brought paint, rollers, ladders and snacks to the park, where they painted the top half of both walls with a protective seal and then another coat of matching gray paint on top of that, in the hopes of protecting the park against future acts of vandalism.

Reader Cliff Cooper sent in these photos. He wrote,

It looks as though the left side is completely clean, but there clearly having difficulty removing from the corrugated siding.

Through most of the graffiti is gone, there is still a faint indication of the paint on the metal siding. The majority of the tags were removed the day after the vandalism took place, however because the concrete walls were only sealed up to 11 feet high, it has taken this long to remove the remainder.

(Thanks to Cliff Cooper for the pictures and tip!)