User talk:Jimmylembcke

Ghetto Quilt Effect --- Graffiti and how we are spending over $40 billion on its issues
In November 2007 2 women were shot when they confronted Graffiti taggers! Graffiti is no longer a victim less crime. I have been working with DOTs, DOEs, Chambers of Commerce, and Gang Task Forces trying to help educate our cities about graffiti. The last time I checked we are spending over 60 Billion on graffiti and related issues.1 20% of any property value is diminished if graffiti is visible from that property. The city of Chicago has set the standard of a 1.3 million fine for not removing graffiti in a reasonable amount of time.2  This has caused all Public Works to feel financial pressure to paint over as much graffiti as possible a day. Matching colors is close to impossible with the factors of weather, oxidation, and UV degradation to compete with. The result of painting over the graffiti is now homes, buildings, and sound walls have a new problem. The graffiti is now hidden by a quilt of colors, all varying in sizes and shapes. Everyone knows the new paint is hiding gang related symbols; the public still show signs of concern and fear in these areas. The vandalism is hidden but the new “Ghetto Quilt Effect” influences the price of properties and strain on businesses. The current paint over solution is in my opinion failing. Gangs are using our walls to advertise sales of their products. Timothy Kephart analyzed 450 tags and wrote his master’s thesis on this very subject.3  Graffiti has been around a while, originally used to rebuke those in power. Gangs are in essence still rebuking the government, they freely use our highways and city walls to  advertise the goods they are selling. Profits are gathered and in some gang structures those serving time distribute the profit. The “Ghetto Quilt Effect” is affecting all of us in one form or another. The Experts agree "Preventative Measures" need to be taken as soon as you see the first patch.

1. The California Association of Realtors gave us information on the decrease in property value in an area that has graffiti; they estimated that the decrease in sales price was approximately 20%. With the California Real Estate as it is, that is a huge loss, given that the current median home in California is $522,590, and last year there were 601,800 detached home sales, just as bare bones figure if graffiti went unchecked, You're looking at 315 Billion is sales and if you use the 20%, you have a possible loss of 63 Billion a year!.. This is California alone.... of course the graffiti problem does not affect all homes sales, but in the higher priced areas, San Fran, Sacramento, LA, Orange County, homes cost upwards of $800,000 or more, so it is all relative. Just an interesting figure..... 2. Chicago, IL. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC") announced today that Judge David H. Coar of the United States District Court in Chicago has entered a $1.3 million Consent Decree resolving an EEOC racial and sexual harassment lawsuit against Foster Wheeler Constructors, Inc. ("Foster Wheeler"). The lawsuit, which EEOC filed in 1998, arose from complaints EEOC received regarding racial and sexual harassment at a Foster Wheeler construction project in Robbins, Illinois. The harassment included racist and sexist graffiti in portable toilets at the Robbins site

3. Timothy Kephart, a Carson crime analyst, graduate student at California State University-Long Beach, and president of Crime Prevention and Graffiti Consulting, analyzed more than 450 gang graffiti photographs in the Carson area for his master’s thesis. “It became clear that gangs were using graffiti to actually communicate,” he says. 4. In this same article, James Q. Wilson, UCLA criminologist and framer of the "broken windows" theory, states that signs of disorder in society--such as graffiti, abandoned cars, broken windows, and uncollected trash--frighten law-abiding Citizens into avoiding public places. Those places are then left to criminals who further deface them, creating a downward spiral in which the fear of crime leads to an increase in criminal activity. The presence of graffiti discourages citizens from shopping or living in affected areas. As established businesses relocate or close, new businesses might be reluctant to move into areas where customers would feel unsafe. As property values decline and law-abiding citizens with resources move, once-thriving neighborhoods can quickly degrade into dangerous places. Thus, the seemingly trivial offense of graffiti ultimately can have devastating consequences for a community.