The Sun
Sunnyvale's Newspaper

Photograph by Skye Dunlap

Sunnyvale Public Safety Officer Steve Swenson conceived Tagnet.

Graffiti Netters

Tagnet has been successful in catching vandals throughout the county

By Pam Marino

Summer brings an increase in kids to local pools and parks. Unfortunately, it also brings an increase in some kids to walls, fences and other spots where they leave graffiti.

Traditionally the end of the school year brings with it the beginning of more graffiti around Sunnyvale.

The annual cost to the city is conservatively $100,000 a year just for graffiti clean up, according to public works officials. The total cost to the city is difficult to calculate, but it is probably many thousands more.

Countywide the cost to taxpayers and private landowners is estimated in the millions every year.

That cost to the public has made the jobs of Sunnyvale Public Safety Officer Steve Swenson and his boss Lt. David Lewis very important, they said. They believe graffiti is a serious crime, and they are treating it as such, going after "taggers" as vigorously as possible.

Swenson, a school resource officer, has been successfully going after taggers for years. But he was frustrated by the fact that many taggers were getting light sentences for their graffiti crimes in Sunnyvale, despite the fact he knew those same taggers were plaguing cities all over the area.

"The tagging doesn't stop at city lines," he said.

In fact, some taggers travel throughout California, and even other states, leaving their telltale marks behind.

So about five months ago Swenson started a group called Tagnet, with three other local agencies. The purpose of the group is to share information with each other about taggers and "piecers," those who leave entire pictures on local walls and fences. Most of the time the graffiti is not gang related, although on occasion it is.

"I realized everybody has a little piece of the puzzle," Swenson said. Tagnet helps "everybody get on the same page."

A tagger's marks are as identifiable as a signature, Swenson said. The tags are carefully photographed and documented by law enforcement officers. Once a month Tagnet agencies meet and share that documentation with one another. In between meetings, officials keep in touch by phone, fax and e-mail.

Tagnet has now grown to 20 agencies, and it has been so successful in bringing cases to the district attorney's office for prosecution, that office now has plans to take the group countywide, according to Assistant District Attorney Marc Buller.

Recently an adult tagger caught in Sunnyvale was charged with 78 cases of graffiti. He was given a four-month county jail sentence, three years of probation, community service, and counseling. He also had to pay restitution for the damage he caused, approximately $5,700 to Sunnyvale alone, Swenson said.

Graffiti is a misdemeanor in California. For adults the punishment is a fine of up to $1,000 and six months in jail. First time juvenile offenders may get probation and community service cleaning up graffiti. Repeat offenders may serve time at a ranch for youth offenders or with the California Youth Authority.

Swenson said one young offender he knows told the officer that whenever he gets the urge to tag, he remembers his six weeks at a ranch.

"He realizes his freedom is the most important thing he has," Swenson said. "He's not willing to lose it again."

It is also a crime for children under age 18 to possess graffiti tools, such as spray paint, large markers and etching stones, for etching graffiti on glass and plastic. For adults it is a crime to possess those tools in connection with an act of graffiti.

Parents may find themselves with many thousands of dollars worth of bills, since they are held responsible for paying restitution, the officers said. Juveniles can also lose their driver's licenses.

Local authorities said most taggers and piecers are males in their teens or early 20s. They are not always considered "bad" kids at home or school although, Swenson said, many of the kids he catches up with don't feel successful in other areas of their lives. They use tagging to fill that need. In the case of piecers, Swenson said they consider what they do to be works of art.

"Fine, do the art, but don't do the crime," Swenson said he tells offenders. "Be a real artist, don't be a criminal."

Swenson and Lewis said the kids they run into usually do not consider graffiti to be a big crime.

"I don't think they understand the damage that they're doing," Lewis said.

Experts agree that the best defense a city has against graffiti is rapid removal. Sunnyvale public works crews go out at least twice a week to remove graffiti from public property. If the graffiti is inflammatory in any way, it is removed within a day or two, said supervisor Dan Burke. He said graffiti usually attracts more graffiti, so removing it right away can put a stop to more.

"We've been so proactive in removing it we've had success in preventing it," Burke said.

Private property owners are required to remove graffiti from their land as soon as possible. Sunnyvale's Neighborhood Preservation office will often work with property owners to help them remove the graffiti as quickly as possible, said Dyane Matas of that office. Matas will even help homeowners get free paint, she said.

Lewis said the public safety department has also started educating junior high kids about graffiti and the consequences of the crime.

Local officers and officials interviewed agreed that parents should keep an eye out for tags in their children's rooms, on their possessions, and in the area around their home. Often kids will practice the tag, they said, before taking it out around the area.

Swenson said he visited the home of a chronic tagger, only to find the boy's mother had let him and his friends cover every inch of his room with tags. The mother said she thought she was doing the boys a favor, by letting them express themselves in the room.

"They had been practicing in her home to go out and do the crime," Swenson said.

The two officers urged local merchants to keep spray paint and other graffiti tools locked up, or out of reach of people who will try to steal the items.

Lewis and Swenson also said they need the public to help out by calling if they see taggers at work. Despite the fact that the department will be increasing patrols in Sunnyvale to be on the lookout for taggers this summer, officers cannot be everywhere at once.

"We need them to call us," Lewis said.

To report tagging as it's happening, call the public safety department at 730-7100. To report graffiti, call the city's hotline at 730-7680.

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This article appeared in the Sunnyvale Sun, June 17, 1998.
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