Graffiti Free Week takes place in March every year.
Keep Australia Beautiful encourages home owners and businesses to help wipe out graffiti by cleaning off the visual litter as soon as it appears. Graffiti vandals or ‘taggers’ enjoy seeing their handiwork on display and that immediate removal helps to prevent copycat offences and vandals from seeing the fruits of their labour.
The public can also report visual litter to the police or local council or cleaning it off wherever appropriate.
The estimated cost of graffiti and other forms of vandalism to the Australian community is a massive $2.7 billion a year, making visual litter the new scourge in our fight against litter bugs.
Apart from the clean-up costs, there are other economic ramifications; people and businesses avoid these areas and real estate prices suffer.
Part of the problem in fighting graffiti has been an absence of national data on where the crime occurs most and the sorts of programs most effective in combating it.
This is why KAB has started tracking the prevalence of graffiti in its annual National Litter Index research.
For the first time, we’ll be able to record graffiti on a national and state by state level which will reveal where the hot spots are located and serve as a trend indicator for future policy decisions.
Residents and business owners can report visual litter to Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or at crimestoppers.com.au
Top tips for targeting taggers:
- Report new graffiti and offenders as soon as possible. Most councils, police and state governments have a reporting service.
- Repair and get rid graffiti ASAP to discourage further conduct.
- Educate fellow residents and business owners that graffiti is vandalism and has no artistic merit.
- Recognise the difference between street art, and graffiti.
- Apply to local councils for assistance to have graffiti removed from private property.
- Consult a landscape designer on ways to deter illegal graffiti through environmental design elements.
- Adopt-a-Spot: Invite the local community to keep a part of their area clean and graffiti-free.
Original Article: Keep Australia Beautiful