SOUTH PORTLAND (AP) – If the City Council gives the OK, South Portland would become Maine’s first municipality to adopt an anti-graffiti ordinance that includes fines or other penalties against minors found on public property with spray paint or other graffiti implements.

Property owners who fail to remove graffiti, and stores that sell spray paint to minors, could also be subject to fines. The proposal, put forward by police, follows an increase in graffiti activity ranging from simple tags to elaborate drawings, a problem people often associate with big cities beyond Maine.

“They have blinders on. They don’t realize that it’s everywhere,” said Officer Jeff Caldwell. “For us, it has really become a problem in the last three or four years.”

The proposed ordinance goes beyond state law, which allows police officers to charge only people caught in the act of creating graffiti. Recommended fines are up to $250 for a first offense and up to $500 for subsequent offenses, plus the costs of graffiti removal.

A similar anti-graffiti law was proposed in the Legislature in 2005 but was not enacted.

The proposed ordinance has drawn opposition from artists who say it would be risky to criminalize possession of certain implements.

“I walk around with exactly those tools all the time,” said Tim Clorius, an artist from Portland. “It’s almost like saying, ‘Tomorrow, no watercolor paper.”‘ Oppposition has also come from businesses concerned about the proposed fines on property owners.

“I have over $8,000 worth of damage right now,” said Louis Maietta, who owns a function hall and an adjacent building on Broadway. “They want us to pay for these villains that have been attacking us for more than two years.”

Maietta said a better solution is surveillance cameras and the use of officers to catch people while they are painting.

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Information from: Portland Press Herald, https://www.pressherald.com

AP-ES-04-14-07 1226EDT