Brooklyn’s losing battles in the war vs. graffiti taggers

BY JEFF WILKINS AND VERONIKA BELENKAYA
DAILY NEWS WRITERS

Rosier/News Patricia Bradford

The most graffiti-scarred building in the city is in the heart of Bushwick — and it’s a public school.

Graffiti vandals hit Intermediate School 349 on Starr St. 20 times last year, NYPD statistics show.

“You can’t turn a corner without seeing graffiti around here. The city cleans it up and the kids just come and do the same thing all over again,” complained Patricia Bradford, who lives nearby.

“It’s not fair,” she said. “I live right beside a church and my house still gets tagged every

summer. It’s bringing property values down.”
Graffiti complaints in north Brooklyn neighborhoods like Bushwick, East New York and Clinton Hill rose 20% since 2007 and arrests for the scrawls increased 24.5%.

The Writing on the Wall: Graffiti Artists Add Color to D.C. Streets

When asked where to find the best graffiti in D.C., Roger Gastman, author of Free Agents, a book about D.C. graffiti history, gave simple advice: Ride the Red Line. Catch the next GUTS bus to Dupont Circle, hop on the Metro in the direction of Glenmont, and grab a window seat. After Union Station, the Metro primarily runs on elevated tracks. The graffiti is clearly visible from the tracks in colorful patches on rooftops and on the sides of buildings. Past New York Avenue, the graffiti presence really asserts itself. Individual tags dominate, and the most-often-repeated names include Pear, Cert, Cave and Strike. You can also see the signature of Cool “Disco” Dan, a graffiti artist who Gastman describes as “iconic.”

There are also several jubilant aerosol art portrayals of President Obama’s face, definitive proof that there are still active graffiti artists in the city. Around Rhode Island Avenue, a few political messages of a leftist slant crop up — most notably, “Capitalism is the Problem” and “Working People Unite.”

NYPD cops in crackdown on graffiti punks

BY WIL CRUZ

DAILY NEWS POLICE BUREAU

Tuesday, January 27th 2009, 9:52 AM

The writing’s on the wall: Graffiti arrests jumped in 2008.

Cops made 10% more busts for tagging and other graffiti crimes last year than in 2007 – a jump to 4,120 arrests from 3,743.

Arrests increased even though New Yorkers made 9% fewer calls to 311 and 911 to report graffiti, cops said.

ALLEGED “MTA” MEMBERS GET ARRESTED…

ALLEGED “MTA” MEMBERS GET ARRESTED…

Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies today arrested at least eight alleged members of the notorious Metro Transit Assassins tagging crew, some of whom are believed to be responsible for a several-blocks-long “MTA” tag in the concrete Los Angeles River bed that authorities say will cost millions of dollars to remove.
The arrests occurred during a series of early-morning raids centered in the Hollywood area. Among those detained for a parole violations is a famous tagger whose work “SMEAR” has has won acclaim in the art community.

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