We were thrilled when Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced new legislation gearing up the city’s war on graffiti by shifting the responsibility of removal from property owners to NYC.
Now instead of motivating homeowners to call 3-1-1, downloading forms from a web site or fining the victims of the vandalism for failure to remove it in a timely fashion, the city can just clean up the vandalism as and where they find it.
This legislation, expected to be passed soon by the City Council according to Bloomberg, will make the removal of graffiti faster and vastly more efficient.
Bloomberg chose to stand symbolically across the street from an often-vandalized restaurant, Manolo’s Mexican Restaurant in Sunnyside. The owners of the eatery traced a loss of business at their establishment directly to being the frequent target of graffiti vandals.
The new law effects a critical change to the process from asking property owners to ‘opt in’ to have their property cleaned by city crews to only having property owners who do not want the city to remove the graffiti to “opt out.”
By accentuating the passive – everybody is eligible for city clean up – homeowners and businesses that frequently took too long to file for clean ups or ask for city help will be able to avoid being fined for not cleaning up the property.
That is a win-win situation for everybody concerned.
In addition to this enlightened “everybody’s in plan,” Bloomberg reminded those at the press conference that the Street Conditions Observation Unit (SCOUT) in the past two years has traveled every block in the city and been reporting bad sites to 3-1-1. So have The Queens Courier and our readers.
The Mayor’s Office of Operations will also work to enable the waiver form on the web site to transmit the requests directly to cleaning crews. In addition, the city will be adding 10 new graffiti power wash trucks with federal funds and creating more efficient routes for the trucks.
This plan for moving forward in the “War on Graffiti” is welcome news here at The Queens Courier as well in every home and business in the borough. Let us all help to make our neighborhoods cleaner and more livable.
