Plan gives counties firmer say on graffiti
Lets them set own rules on spray paint sales, sanctions
By Daniel Scarpinato
Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 03.26.2007

PHOENIX — Graffiti taggers could face tougher sanctions and find it harder to buy "tools" under legislation being pushed by a Tucson lawmaker.
While a number of markers and paints qualify as graffiti "tools," the push is primarily to control the sale of aerosol spray paints.
The bill, sponsored by Republican state Rep. Jennifer Burns, would free Pima County from state restrictions that officials say prevent them from getting tougher on graffiti incidents.
Last week, the Pima County Board of Supervisors approved a graffiti-abatement program aimed mostly at covering up existing vandalism, but officials want to go further, attempting to prevent graffiti before property is tagged.
While cities such as Tucson have enforcement power over graffiti, counties are more restricted because they are considered an arm of the state. That's a problem in Pima County, officials say, because so much of metropolitan Tucson is unincorporated.
HB 2328, which has already passed the House with bipartisan support and is headed toward likely approval in the Senate, allows counties to adopt and enforce ordinances related to the sale of graffiti tools such as spray paints, while attempting to protect retailers from added costs. It would also give counties the power to punish those caught with graffiti tools.
"The problem is exacerbated in Pima County's case because we essentially have a city that's not a city," said Martin Willett, deputy county administrator. "We don't know that we would do exactly what the city of Tucson does, but we know we would do more than we do now."
The bill lays out recommended mandates for counties to impose on retailers that sell spray paint or other tagging instruments, though counties are not required to adopt them.
If Pima County chose to, it could require retailers to keep the products in sight of a cashier, have them locked somewhere that customers can't have access or keep them in an area that is monitored by electronic surveillance.
"This is providing options," Burns said. "These are minimum safeguards that retailers have already done in many cases."
Willett said the county hasn't decided on a potential ordinance yet, but it could be modeled after one the city has been using for several years.
In Tucson, retailers are already restricted from selling graffiti tools to minors, and the paraphernalia must be locked away or within sight of store workers.
But without similar rules in the county, it's difficult for the city to cut down on tagging, said Eliseo Garza, director of Tucson's Department of Neighborhood Resources.
"It damages property," he said. "There's a pretty good perception within the community that where there's graffiti there's other problems."
Many large national retailers may already meet many of the requirements in Burns' bill, but smaller retailers are the ones most often affected by such regulations, said Michelle Ahlmer, executive director of the Arizona Retail Association.
"It can be very onerous. The best approach is to be as uniform as possible," Ahlmer said. Some retailers may not be able to afford to lock up graffiti materials.
"The problem with doing it in line of sight is, stores have other products that need to be in line of sight," she said.
Southern Arizona municipalities, which say they are seeing an increase in tagging, are also looking to deter the practice by removing graffiti quickly.
Before last week's action by the Board of Supervisors, county residents had to take care of graffiti on their own. A nonprofit group that previously did removal in the city of Tucson lost its funding and shut down about a year ago.
The county has painted over or sandblasted graffiti on public property, but it had no program for county residents.
With Burns' bill, officials are betting that taggers will find it harder to vandalize property in the first place.
But neither the county nor the city, which spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on graffiti abatement each year, have any way of knowing if the efforts are working. Both are creating databases to track incidents but have only started doing so this year.
In Tucson, Garza projects the city will cover or remove 2.3 million square feet of graffiti this year. The main targets of vandals in both the city and county are cement walls along washes and on bridges.
It's "anywhere that provides a big canvas to work on and a hideaway, so to speak, for individuals to sit where no one can see them," said Julie Simon, manager of the county's graffiti-abatement program.
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● Contact reporter Daniel Scarpinato at 307-4339 or dscarpinato@azstarnet.com.