Tagging and Community Pride

Today I want to talk about community pride and how valuable it is. In Hastings, people are very proud of where they live and their city. In an often reserved way people actually love living here.

This community pride has raced to the surface as people in their droves get behind our recent assault on graffiti. Why, because people are heartedly sick of the mindless vandalism. It has gone unchallenged for too long!!! The $200,000 the Hastings District Council spends a year on the issue is also a completely unnecessary cost.

The real leader in the kickback on this is Judge Tony Adeane. He stood up and sent a tagger to jail because, in his view, the community were completely sick of the action by a senseless few. Good on him and long may it continue.

This was then followed by the highly publicised incident in Havelock North where a young man was caught by the owner of a bar. He dished out some of his own treatment including painting some of the offender’s property. His clothes and his face.

These two stories put the issue slap bang back into the public space. We had national radio and TV stories on them reflecting. Subsequently when the gates at the A&P Showground’s were targeted again by another mindless painting HB Today decided to profile the issue and with the assistance of many have got a reward available of $800 to the people leading to the arrest of the person responsible.

This is being talked about everywhere in our community and around the country. It is all about a community saying we are not going to accept this anymore. I am not one of these liberals who wants to set up special walls for the art. We have tried that and it doesn’t work. I also don’t buy into the ridiculous argument that somehow this is cultural expression.

Quite simply, most people want to string the culprits up. Put the boot on the other foot and the parents of these kids wouldn’t want their front fence or car painted. The kids themselves would be very upset if they had their clothes painted over. So good on us all for saying enough is enough. Hastings is proud and is not going to tolerate this anymore.

Those are my thoughts for the week.

I’m Lawrence Yule.