Graffiti Payback Scheme

 Young People Now describe a scheme being run in Enfield:

In an attempt to crack down on graffiti and antisocial behaviour, Ealing Council is piloting a scheme to tackle the problem head on.

Under the Graffiti Payback Scheme, groups of young offenders are made to put right their criminal behaviour and make amends with the community.

The scheme, which is run by Ealing Youth Offending Service in partnership with the council’s ‘envirocrime’ prevention team, has led to many graffiti artists undertaking re-painting work at graffiti hot spots across the west London borough. The work is undertaken under court order and the young people are not paid.

Source: Young People Now

I have a piece on the City Mayors website about how Lewisham has been using Mediaklik, and a wider application of mobile technology on local government:

Next year will see the tenth anniversary of the increasingly ubiquitous camera phone. In South East London it, along with the introduction of the borough council ‘Love Lewisham’ website (www.lovelewisham.org), has transformed the way many residents report environmental problems and engage with the council.

Encams Cleaner Safer Greener Network highlights our partners in Lewisham:

Lewisham Council is using the latest technology to make the borough a cleaner and greener place in which to live and work.

The Love Lewisham campaign encourages employees, councillors and members of the public to report instances of graffiti and fly-tipping using their camera phones.

They can take pictures of environmental crimes and text the photo along with details of where it was spotted to a dedicated council unit receiving the tip-offs.

CPSO from Downham talks about using Mediaklik

(via Love Lewisham)

James Senior who writes about “Windows Vista and other cool technology” describes a presentation from Microsoft.  It included a plug for our partners over at Love Lewisham.  James says:

A Local London Borough’s initative to combat anti-social activities like grafitti and rubbish dumping.  Residents are encourage to upload their photos to the Love Lewisham website and the locate their photo using Live Maps - the council then sort out the problem much more quickly.  What a great way to bring the community together! 

Private Land

Our experience is that fly tipping on private land is often misunderstood by members of the public.  We think that Mediaklik can help.

Traditionally they have written or phoned the local authority to report fly tipping, and have been frustrated when nothing seems to happen.

Of course the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act does give local authorities powers to require owners of land to clean up fly tipping on their land, but it is often a more drawn out process than members of the public appreciate.  The guidance sets out what local authorities can do in more detail:

The Environment Agency and local authorities will be able to serve a notice on a landowner requiring him to clear fly-tipped waste from his land. Notices can be served on a landowner if there is no occupier, or the occupier cannot be found without the authority incurring unreasonable expense. Notices can also be served where the owner is not the occupier if the authority has served a notice on the occupier but either he has failed to comply with the requirement or the notice has been quashed. An owner or occupier has grounds for appeal against a requirement to remove or deal with waste under section 59 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 if he can satisfy the court that he neither deposited nor knowingly caused nor knowingly permitted the deposit of the waste.

The Environment Agency and local authorities have previously been able to serve a notice requiring the removal of the waste on the occupier of land where fly-tipping occurred. The occupier could appeal against a notice if he neither deposited nor knowingly caused nor knowingly permitted the deposit of the waste. However, no notice could be served on culpable land owners where there was no occupier. [more]

Its also often the case that enforcement resources are stretched  making it possible for sites like the one in the photo to become overrun.

While Mediaklik can’t magic away the fly tip what it can do is help explain what the process is to members of the public which use the service.

Because there is the facility to send back text or email messages to anyone who reports an issue the authority can keep them up to date on the progress in finding out who owns the land and what action is being taken to get them to clean up their land.

The Use of Community Art Projects and Murals as a Means of Controlling Graffiti

The Graffiti Hotline website have the results of an interesting survey on how people see attempts to co-opt graffiti art as a way of controling illegal graffiti.

From my reading of their findings I thought that there isn’t that much public acceptance of mural art or the community art projects that try to work alongside young people who are interested in graffiti art.

However, as a journey the survey seems to have changed the outlook of the author of the report:

At the start of this survey I stated that after 15 years of combating graffiti I was biased and that my views placed me firmly in the ‘all graffiti is bad’ camp. To my surprise, after this piece of research, I now find myself in the ‘most graffiti is bad, but it could be good’ camp.

I have been amazed at what some can achieve with a spray can. It seems that by allowing time to create a piece of work then the quality of the finished work increases dramatically.

(via Cllr Bob Piper)

Litter

I see that the LGA are endorsing the use of “shock tactics” to show members of the public their impact on litter. They are suggesting that some councils might stop picking up litter for a defined period to show just how much we drop, and point out:

People in England drop 30 million tonnes of litter every year, that’s enough rubbish to fill 1,500 aircraft carriers.

It costs local authorities £663 million a year to clear up this rubbish.

White Paper

The Local Government White Paper, Strong and prosperous communities, is out today.  The BBC have been covering it have have used LoveLewisham as way of explaining what the paper is trying to do.

You can see the video here, read what the BBC say here and see the LoveLewisham blog here.

 The White Paper itself has this to say about Lewisham’s use of the Mediaklik technology:

local authorities are using information technology to improve responsiveness to local people’s needs. For example, the ‘LoveLewisham’ scheme allows residents to text or email pictures of problems like graffiti or fly-tipping to the council. The pictures appear on a website so the public can track what action is being taken.

graffiti and the law

I saw this on my lunch break today and thought it might be useful to look at what the law says about graffiti.

Graffiti is criminal damage as set out in the Criminal Damage Act 1971 and if the damage caused to a building is more than £5,000 then if caught the person responsible could face upto 10 years imprisonment (if they are over 18).  Young people between the age of 12 and 17 can be detention and training order of up to 24 months.

Where the damage is less the maximum penalty is 3 months imprisonment or a fine of upto 32,500 for adults.

Local authorities also have the ability to use Fixed Penalty Notices.  The Cleaner Neighbourhoods and Environment Act enables a local authority to vary the fixed penalty amount for a graffiti or fly-posting offence in its area. Where no amount is specified by a local authority the base amount is £75.

The Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 makes it an offence to sell aerosol paints to persons aged under 16.

Local authorities also have the power to require that graffiti is removed and if it isn’t to reclaim the costs.