Originally published September 4 2005
Los Angeles may increase city video surveillance program
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
Video surveillance cameras have been keeping taggers away from selected neighborhoods, and the city is considering expanding the program citywide.
A video surveillance camera installed at Lake Street Park as part of an aggressive neighborhood graffiti abatement program has been so successful that Los Angeles police and city officials said Monday they want to expand it citywide.
Since the program was launched a year ago, the anti-graffiti campaign has been credited with reducing the amount of tagging in the neighborhood by more than 60%, said Councilman Eric Garcetti, who initiated the program.
ADVERTISEMENT "We're keeping a step ahead of them and that's discouraging them," said Garcetti, who was joined by Police Chief William J. Bratton at a news conference at the park north of Beverly Boulevard and Alvarado Street.
As part of the program, officials said there are plans to install 12 additional video cameras in neighborhoods along the Vermont Avenue corridor beginning next year.
Resident Joselyn Geaga-Rosenthal, 58, said that the anti-graffiti effort, dubbed UNTAG, or Uniting Neighborhoods to Abolish Graffiti, has given the working-class community a sense of empowerment.
The abatement program is unusual in that it puts the responsibility of reporting the tagging on the neighborhood's residents.
Volunteers are assigned several blocks to monitor and required to call in any vandalism to city authorities.
There are dozens of graffiti removal and paint crews that operate throughout Garcetti's 13th Council District, which includes Echo Park, Hollywood and Silver Lake.
Bratton urged residents to help monitor and protect their neighborhoods.
Tagging is often associated with gang activity as a way for gang members to mark their territory or send out messages to other gangs.
"You have to keep at this every day --- day in and day out," said Bratton, who estimates that there are more than 300,000 taggings throughout the city.
But not all tagging is gangrelated, and some young people view the spray-painting as a form of artistic expression.
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