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Graffiti costs businesses customers, profits
By Shannon Cavanaugh
Contributing Writer
A spray-painted skeletal arm and hand reach out to customers who walk past businesses along King Street. Tourists looking at historic buildings in downtown Charleston notice graffiti along a second story.
The letters and designs grow even bolder away from downtown. On James Island, taggers, the term used for those who spray paint graffiti, mark their territory with words like “kill or die” across a vacant business where grass grows six feet tall and litter is scattered across the parking lot.
“Graffiti sends a negative message that nobody cares,” said Sgt. Trevor Shelor of the Charleston Police Department as he took photos of graffiti for evidence. “If you let it sit, it creates a big domino effect. You let them paint on this, next time they’ll set fire to it and you see the neighborhood go down.
“This is just taggin’, braggin’, glue sniffin’ skateboard punks. This is not gang graffiti. Usually gang-related graffiti is marked with three initials that stand for their name.”
Graffiti is more than just an eyesore and blight on a community. It also negatively affects the psyche of businesses and customers.
“Any moment a customer sees graffiti or a light burned out in the parking lot, forget it. They’re scared for their safety and don’t want to shop in that business,” said Connie Kunzler, program manager for Graffiti Hurts, a program sponsored by Keep America Beautiful.
“Graffiti really impacts a business’ bottom line. It signals something is not right and no one cares, so customers automatically think, ‘What else is wrong in the neighborhood?’ This results in less customer traffic. Businesses need to do two things: They should prevent graffiti to begin with and get graffiti off as soon as possible.”
Vigilance a key
Graffiti is not just an urban problem. On a vacant 11,500-square-foot warehouse on Folly Road, what started with one spray-painted initial two years ago has grown into brightly colored graffiti covering three sides of the building, which is currently on the market, along with 8.67 acres, for $6.95 million.
Graffiti is the last thing a real estate agent wants to see on one of his or her properties.
“Graffiti impacts it more from leasing to a prospective tenant instead of a buyer,” said real estate agent Eddie Buxton. “It makes them wonder how secure the property is. The buyer for this property will likely demolish the building, but repainting the warehouse is negotiable.”
Across the United States, cities are using taxpayer dollars to clean up graffiti. Government agencies estimate it costs municipalities $15 billion a year to remove graffiti, but Kunzler said there’s really no way to come up with a total.
In some cities the graffiti problem is growing, but Atlanta has taken a stand to stop the problem. With a three-prong approach of rapid removal, education and early prevention, graffiti is decreasing in the South’s largest city, Kunzler said.
Capt. John Clark of the Charleston County Sheriff’s Office encourages business owners to take pride in keeping their property clean of graffiti and to call in a complaint even if the graffiti is not on their property.
“Be vigilant. Watch your business with a close eye. Pay attention and document the graffiti. Take a picture,” said Clark. “Graffiti is a message that someone’s trying to send. Something’s going on in the neighborhood, and they leave a calling card on your business. Read it and understand it.”
At taxpayer expense
Overall, Charleston is not experiencing as much gang graffiti as northern cities, but Shelor said Charleston police still have their hands full, especially with college starting back.
“It shouldn’t be the police department’s responsibility to cover graffiti. It should be the responsibility of the property owner, but that’s how it is here,” said Shelor as he documented graffiti on a Folly Road building. “I’m kind of upset that (Charleston Police Department’s) Team 3 did not call this one in. It’s so blatant. I can’t believe they just rode by. Seeing this actually hurts my eyes.”
The scene that had Shelor riled is 1311 Folly Road, a convenience store that now sits vacant at a major intersection. According to records at the Charleston County Assessor’s Office, the property is valued at $780,000 and owned by a company in Phoenix.
Shelor took photos of the property and turned them over to the maintenance crew with the Charleston Police Department. The crew painted over the graffiti within one week. The cost to paint the building came at taxpayer expense and was taken from the department’s operations budget. The Livability Court has given the owner five days to clean up the property or face a possible lien on the property.
“It must be nice to have property like this, to be this rich and not care about this property,” said a Mount Pleasant man who declined to give his name, but operates his furniture business from the back of his truck on the property’s parking lot. “It’s really prime property, and what an eyesore for people going to the beach.”
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