Graffiti debate includes talk of banning spray paint sales
Some councillors don’t want stores selling cans to minors
By MICHAEL LIGHTSTONE Staff Reporter

The rhetorical holy war municipal politicians have launched on the anti-graffiti front in metro continued unabated Tuesday at city hall.

At a regional council meeting dealing with a proposed graffiti bylaw, councillors talked tough, named companies they feel are contributing to the problem and encouraged one another to do something about the situation.

There was talk of banning the sale of spray paint to children, a call for organizations hit by graffiti vandals to quickly clean their sites and an appeal to parents to do a better job supervising their kids.

"Responsible retailing" and "community responsibility" were the buzz words of the meeting as councillors criticized such firms as Canadian Tire and Loomis, an art supply store, for selling goods to minors that can be used for graffiti vandalism.

"If you have a group of (youngsters) walking in and buying spray paint for their class project in the middle of the summer, . . . we have to talk to the corporate entity," said Coun. Patrick Murphy (Halifax North End).

Coun. Bob Harvey (Lower Sackville) said Canadian National’s railway bridges are "the worst examples" of graffiti vandalism in the city. "Let’s close the tracks until they clean up their bridges," he said.

Coun. Andrew Younger (East Dartmouth-The Lakes) said Halifax Regional Municipality should clean up its own act before it attacks companies.

"Until (the city) can meet a standard, I don’t think we can bring a bylaw in until HRM is going to follow that," he told the meeting.

Regional council directed staff to report on a six-part motion on the graffiti problem presented by Coun. Linda Mosher (Purcells Cove-Armdale). Dan English, the municipality’s chief administrative officer, said graffiti in metro will never be eliminated.

"What our aim is our goal is to reduce it and try to manage it," he said