Tracy Press

Tracy has what it takes to brush back graffiti.

Visit a handful of Tracy’s neighborhood parks and you’re bound to see some graffiti, which may or may not be the calling card of gangs. Some of it looks harmless, even artistic, but some sightings are ominous enough to keep you in your car, as you lock your doors and speed away.

Tracy public works employee Jeff Chancellor selects the best color match before painting over a section of a sound wall defiled by graffiti. Chancellor works as part of the city’s Graffiti Busters program to eliminate tagging within 24 hours. Press file photo.

A 9-year-old boy recently noticed graffiti in the planters and overhangs at Slayter Park near his home. He told his mother, and instead of ignoring it, she enlisted a neighbor’s help; together, they bought paint and covered the graffiti themselves.

Something similar happened when four young men saw large graffiti tags on the handball wall in the Southside’s McDonald Park. They went to a hardware store to buy paint, and the clerk gave it to them. They cleaned up the wall and promised they’d keep an eye on it.

Does Tracy have a zero-tolerance attitude toward graffiti vandalism?

No, not yet.

Does Tracy have what it takes to become graffiti-free?

Yes, we think so, and here’s why:

• Three city departments work on graffiti. The Public Works Department has a full-time worker who drives a truck around town to look for graffiti, with a goal of painting over anything found on public property within 24 hours.

Code enforcement deals with graffiti found on private property and gives property owners 10 days to cover it. It has a voucher program for the downtown area — and is preparing to ask the City Council to expand it citywide — that pays as much as $50 for materials to remove graffiti.

And the police department’s volunteers monitor a graffiti hotline, which accepts anonymous messages about graffiti sightings and passes on the information to the appropriate departments. 

• The city has taken on several projects over the past 10 years to support youth and fight gangs. Its greatest effort so far is the Mayor’s Community Youth Support Network, proposed by Councilwoman Evelyn Tolbert in late 2006. The network is made up of city departments, schools and community partners, such as the Boys and Girls Clubs of Tracy.

In February, the council allocated $1 million to the effort for 2008, with the goal of helping young people stay connected, or reconnect, with their parents and the community. 

• Tracy is led by a police chief who truly understands the nature of Tracy’s gang problem. Chief David Krauss has studied San Jose’s efforts, which have been effective in lowering gang violence in the state’s third-largest city. With that model, he has pledged to take a bold approach to Tracy’s gang issues, using a balanced brew of prevention, intervention and suppression. 

Beginning this week, the police department has an anti-gang unit. Within a few months, it will be fully operational, with four officers and a sergeant devoted to gang work.

• Finally, and perhaps most importantly, we have a community willing to roll up its sleeves and get to work, one paintbrush at a time.

With the combined efforts of the city and the community, we can send a strong message that graffiti won’t be tolerated in our home town.

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written by amy , April 16, 2008

It would be nice if there is a program in place that would "employ" the juvenile offender's time by putting them to work painting over the graffiti markings?

That way they will see how much fun it is to paint over it (early in the mornings) as compared to marking up the town by their own peers?

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written by Dave Hardesty , April 16, 2008

amy

I completely agree with you here. Unfortunately the legalities and logistics necessary to make that happen are not currently possible and are now cost prohibitive.

The problems involve several issues. The first issue is liability and what liability the city would have to assume should one of these juveniles get injured while being "employed" to paint over their markings.

Then you need to come up with the salaries and benefits cost to hire the legally capable personnel to monitor these juveniles while they are performing their work.

Additionally you need to come up with the money to defray the costs of the equipment and supplies these juveniles would utilize while performing their work.

It might be relatively easy to mitigate these costs if these costs were passed on to the parents of the juvenile offenders as a part of their responsibility for their juvenile’s actions in society, until they become adults and can be held directly responsible for their acts.

However it seems our courts are reticent to force parents to accept the financial restitution responsibilities for errant juveniles so the only recourse left is something like you witness in the article above.

Until these people are personally held accountable for their actions nothing much is really going to change. To do it will require a different mindset from our general population on how to deal with juveniles and a change in the mindset of the sentencing judges.

Dave Hardesty

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written by amy , April 16, 2008

That is right, Dave Hardesty.... I figured with all the legalitys and ramfications of it would defeat what could have been an "invaluable life" lessons for them, too bad their parents won't have the chance to "assist" them in the cleaning of the city. Just wishful thinking during these frustrating times.

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written by infoonly , April 17, 2008

A juvenile graffiti offender's parents usually will be the ones responsibile for paying to clean-up the mess. Also, the presiding judge can order the offender to community service work which includes painting over graffiti. Supervision of these offenders is usually overseen by youth counselors and occasionally a sheriff's deputy.