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LOCAL NEWS
MISSIONVALLEYNEWS.COM — OCTOBER 11, 2013
Graffiti, from page 9 Between Jan. 1 and Aug. 20, the police department’s Grafiti Strike Force Unit culled 457 crime cases using Grafiti Tracker, Zwibel said. This number is about the same as the number for the same time period last year. A couple years ago, Grafiti Tracker helped La Mesa snag a juvenile suspected of tagging the name “Boston” on at least 71 different occasions. The suspect was charged with felony vandalism. Contrary to popular belief, grafiti tagging is not normally related to narcotic sales, Zwibel said. Instead, taggers are usually looking for notoriety, especially for getting their moniker onto hard-to-reach places, such as freeway overpasses. There are also gang-related taggers, “where gangs are claiming a turf or trying to intimidate rival gangs by crossing out each other’s tags,” he said. The city relies on Urban Corps to clean up grafiti on city buildings, but the cost of removal depends on the overall size of the grafiti tag and the surface on which it was painted or etched. The process for grafiti on private property is a bit different. The property owner must provide their written legal consent to city staff before the grafiti can be removed. According to the city website, the process of obtaining consent from a private property owner to remove grafiti can take
several weeks. The process can take even longer if city staff are dealing with a high number of grafiti incidents at a given time. Different government entities have their own processes for removing grafiti from their property. Grafiti on structures in the public right of way, for example, is handled by the city’s Department of Public Works. San Diego Gas & Electric, the United States Postal Service, Metropolitan Transit Service, Waste Management, Caltrans and cable companies all are responsible for removing grafiti from their own properties. Rather than keep track of all the various agencies to call if vandalism is found on their property, witnesses can simply dial 2-1-1 to report grafiti to the operator, who will then route the information to the appropriate agency. If you witness grafiti vandalism in progress, city oficials request that you report it immediately to city police or to the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department.
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eral ireighters from Miramar were standing in the parking lot of a service station just off the 52. They were waiting to be put to work, but they no way of knowing where they were needed. They had no common radio frequency, and cell phone communications were nearly impossible. That problem has been taken By Doug Curlee care of. That said, there is one inesStaf Editor capable conclusion Mainar reluctantly draws. “We know that irestorms will ooking back on the irestorms of 2003 and 2007 happen here again. It’s just a in San Diego, Fire Chief Javier matter of when.” Mainar looks around at the Mainar is justiiably proud of the progress local, state and abundance of bone-dry fuel federal ire oficials have made available and eyes the calendar, noting our ire season and the Santa Ana winds- haven’t hit us yet. They will, he says.
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in preparing for the next one. More ireighters, more equipment, better communications, and an overall battle plan involving cooperation among all ire agencies are just some of the improvements lessons from the past have brought us. Better communications regionwide may be the single most important improvement among the several Mainar cites. I recall during the 2003 irestorms, when a crew of fed-
stopped by Navy and Marine Corps choppers when needed. If lames do get loose in the Regional Park, aerial attack may be the only way to head them off quickly. The ongoing battle over the control tower at Ramona airport adds wrinkles to the frowns on the faces of state and Federal air attack oficials. Ramona is the home of the irst ire attack base in the United States, and it’s a resource whose value cannot be overestimated. In 2003 and 2007, many of the homes that caught ire were victims of exploding eucalyptus trees. When a eucalyptus tree gets hot, the sap inside boils and explodes, sometimes casting burning embers 100 feet or more. Australia did us no favors sending us those trees, pretty though they may be.
Danger spots
Look over the fence
Perhaps the biggest single concern, although far from the only one, is Mission Trails Regional Park, and the way it butts up against Highway 52 and the Del Cerro-san Carlos fringes. Should lames get a foothold there, it will require a lightningfast, overwhelming response to save homes along the fringe areas. There are still more than a few homes in the area with plenty of exposed wood. There are still shake roofs out there. The regional ireighting efforts have added a lot of airpower to the ire attack plan, with cityoperated helicopters now back-
Everywhere you look, though, there are areas and structures still at risk. Most people have done a good job of keeping vegetation growth far enough away from their homes, but aerial surveys point out there is still a great deal of work to be done in that area. Mainar says we are as prepared now as we can be for the ire season, but he has to note that his optimism can only go so far in the face of undeniable facts. “There are not enough ireighters, enough ireighting equipment, or enough water to stop a Santa Ana-driven wildire.”