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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Monday, August 8, 2005

Graffiti cleanup canceled, thanks to advance help

By Suzanne Roig
Advertiser East Honolulu Writer

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'AINA HAINA — A graffiti cleanup planned for this weekend has been canceled because there isn't enough to clean up.

That's because so many volunteers have been hard at work. And at a recent meeting in tiny 'Aina Haina, East Honolulu volunteers learned there were others like them in Pearl City, Kailua and Manoa who also are working to wipe out graffiti in their communities.

Graffiti has been popping up more and more on schools, bus stops, freeway walls and private property islandwide. But because there has been so much help recently, there isn't enough work along the canals, bridges and other public places to merit the cleanup of 'Aina Haina and Niu Valley that was to be sponsored Saturday by Rep. Lyla Berg, D-18th (Kahala, 'Aina Haina, Kuli'ou'ou).

"There really is very little to do," said Bill Paul, a Niu Valley resident who organized the recent community meeting. "That's very good."

Residents fed up with the graffiti want the police to take the problem seriously and want laws that will make it harder for vandals to buy the custom art kits that they use to spray paint.

Enabling the police to use the traffic cameras to capture the vandals on state highways and city streets would be another way to nab them.

"I'm extremely impressed by what you are all doing here," said Arthur Medeiros, a Kapahulu resident. "I've been painting over graffiti for the past four or five years on and off, whenever I get aggravated enough.

"Graffiti bugs me."

Police try their best, but it's capturing the vandals that is the difficult part.

Under a newly passed law, those convicted of graffiti vandalism for the third time in five years will see the offense elevated to a misdemeanor, meaning jail time and a $2,000 fine.

Just last month police arrested eight boys and a man for 26 graffiti-related offenses in 'Aiea, Pearl City and Waipahu.

Police were never able to arrest the vandals who painted graffiti on the playground and cafeteria second-floor wall at Koko Head Elementary School. It cost the school $500 to hire someone to paint over the wall. But it took more than a week to have the work done.

Paul, a retired publisher, started painting over graffiti just a couple months ago and has now painted every electric signal box on Kalaniana'ole Highway with a fresh coat of paint, wiping out every trace of graffiti.

He organized the community meeting recently to solicit help from others in the East Honolulu area to paint out graffiti in the valleys, but he found that people from around the island want to help.

"It's wonderful if this spreads," Paul said at the meeting. "We can't be discouraged or defeatist. We need to take small steps to slow it down."

Alvin Wong, a resident of Pearl City, said the problem with graffiti is more than the spray paint damage, and solving the problem will require the schools, the parents and the community to say, "No more."

"These people who do graffiti are no different than people who break into your house," Paul said. "They're cowards."

"It's crucial to be vigilant," said Dean Berko, a Hawai'i Kai resident who started painting over graffiti on his own about 10 months ago. "I'm wearing them down. Aggressive mitigation of the problem wears them down, and maybe they'll find something else to do because their insignias will be gone the next day."