Central Victoria's Mount Alexander Shire has earned the dubious title of the state's 'graffiti capital'. With data showing there's more per capita in the municipality, than Melbourne. As the shire turns its attention to tagging prevention, a local graffiti artist is calling for designated spaces for taggers to express themselves freely.
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00:00 Castle Mane is renowned for its quaint cottages and tree-lined streets, but among the old
00:07 gold mining town's historic buildings, graffiti tags abound.
00:11 I can look at graffiti and appreciate art.
00:14 That tagging is not art.
00:16 Clem Purvis' business was recently targeted by taggers.
00:21 One of the store's security cameras captured vandals as they illegally got to work on their
00:26 chosen canvas, roller doors.
00:28 They've only been up there for 18 months and to come in on that morning and see them vandalised
00:34 was really disheartening and heartbreaking.
00:36 This tagging is just one example of what's becoming a rising problem in Mount Alexander
00:42 Shire.
00:43 In 2023, there have been 330 graffiti incidents per capita in the Shire.
00:49 The City of Melbourne had 222 graffiti incidents per capita.
00:56 Police have largely attributed the surge in graffiti crime to officers proactively reporting
01:01 incidents instead of waiting for victims to come forward.
01:05 We've put together a graffiti register of various tags so we can link the offending
01:10 to various people.
01:13 Residents who spoke to us told us they wouldn't go on camera for fear of becoming the target
01:17 of a reprisal graffiti attack.
01:19 Some of them have stopped cleaning the graffiti off of their property because when they do,
01:24 the tags return to do more damage.
01:26 In an effort to erase the issue, the Council has hired a graffiti officer at a cost of
01:31 $60,000 per year.
01:34 That person's role is to do a helicopter view across the organisation, the community groups
01:41 and the police.
01:42 But a long-time graffiti artist says there needs to be more public spaces for people
01:47 to legally express themselves.
01:49 You want your identity to be something cool, yeah?
01:51 You don't want it to just be some scribble on the wall.
01:53 [BLANK_AUDIO]