City wrestles with graffiti problem at skate park
RICHARD ECKE Tribune Staff Writer


Great Falls sports one of the region's finest skate parks, a two-year-old gem located in Elks Riverside Park.

But the skate park and its gleaming white concrete from the early days have given way to spray-painted messages galore.

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The skate park is beset by graffiti.

"It's the worst that we've ever seen it," said Patty Rearden, deputy director of the City Park and Recreation Department.

Not all of it features "very undesirable language and phrases," Rearden said.

"Some of that was actually quite creative," Rearden told the City Commission last week.

Even so, the problem has been continual, she said.

Removing graffiti from the entire park can cost more than $2,000, with two people working for three to five days, Rearden said. Labor accounts for more than half of the total, she said.

And then people come along and paint more graffiti.

Rearden said the city has several options in dealing with graffiti, none of them completely satisfying.

She said Great Falls, like skate park operators in Helena and Billings, could simply decide to leave the graffiti, except for especially offensive renderings.

Another option would be to paint over the graffiti with gray paint, but that would make the park slippery.

The city also could fence the park, charge admission and have city personnel on hand.

"None of the three options are real great," Rearden said. She said few skate parks go for the option of charging admission.

Some of the graffiti is attractive, such as a pumpkin head, or the Mona Lisa, although a vandal portrayed Leonardo DaVinci's famous subject holding a gun.

Mayor Dona Stebbins said she thought the Mona Lisa copy was well done, but "I could have done without the ornament."

City Commissioner Sandy Hinz said she would want to see gang-related graffiti removed. Police Chief Corky Grove said he did not spot any gang-related graffiti in photographs shown at the meeting.

Green Party member Paul Stephens of Great Falls said some the graffiti artists do "very nice work."

"Some of them actually become famous artists later on," Stephens said.

Stephens suggested removing graffiti that is in poor taste, but keeping the artistic work.

Commissioners made no decisions last week, although several were clearly irritated by defacing of the skate park.

Several fires have been set in restrooms next to the skate park, causing extensive damage, Rearden reported.

Policing the area is not easy, officials said.

Great Falls Police Sgt. Shane Sorensen said the park has had partial video surveillance since it opened in 2004.

"It does have its uses," he said. But it does not cover the entire area, and it does not prevent vandals from placing graffiti there.

Reach Tribune Staff Writer Richard Ecke at recke@greatfal.gannett.com, or at 406-791-1467 or 800-438-6600.