Choose a Project

First you need to choose the approach you'll use. Do you want to educate or repair and restore or both? Before you start your own project, check with local law enforcement organizations, civic associations, Neighborhood Watch groups, and others in the community about antivandalism or antigraffiti efforts that might already be under way. One such example is the Greater D.C. Cares organization, which sponsors Servathon, an annual volunteer day. For Servathon '98, 4,000 volunteers painted, weeded, cleared trash, and removed graffiti at 57 sites around the Washington, D.C., area (The Washington Post, May 3, 1998). You may be able to join such a group or work in ways that complement its efforts. You may also be able to share information, materials, or tools.

Educating the Public

If you have decided to educate the public about vandalism and graffiti, you will need to decide on your target audience. Is it your peers in school? Younger students? Adults in the community? What do they already know about vandalism and what do you need to help them learn? How much time can you spend on educating the group? You will need to match your time and resources with the size of the group and the education tasks you want to accomplish.

Repairing Damage

If you've decided to work on repairing damage caused by vandalism, you will need to identify a place, or places, where your group will work. Talk with the property owner (whether a private owner or the local government or school district) to obtain permission. You might even get an offer of help in the form of paint, brooms, trash bags, or refreshments! Check out organizations that deal with neighborhood beautification in your community. They are often looking for eager volunteers.

In Caldwell, ID, youth and adult volunteers have formed a graffiti removal task force. Run by the Idaho Chamber of Commerce in coordination with the police and other local agencies, the task force keeps graffiti removal equipment at the Chamber's downtown site. As graffiti is spotted in the community, the task force coordinator is alerted. The coordinator immediately calls on volunteers to remove the graffiti. This system has been so successful that the local juvenile court has asked to be able to assign youth to serve with the task force as part of their court-ordered community service for nonviolent crimes.

Identify Resources and Make a Plan

Whatever project your group decides on, you will need to develop a plan of the steps involved in starting your project, carrying it out, and completing it. Identify the resources you'll need -- the number of volunteers and the skills they'll need, as well as the materials they will require (such as tools, paints, etc.). Try to collect these resources through donations to keep costs down. Check with hardware and home repair stores, businesses that have their own maintenance staff, school maintenance staffs, and parents to see if they would be willing to donate materials to your project.

Decide as part of the plan how you will measure the success of your project. Will people repeat your antigraffiti or antivandalism mes-sage to friends and family? Will the building remain graffiti free for at least 6 months? Will your restored areas (e.g., repaired windows) remain intact?

Recruit and Train Volunteers

The main ingredient in a successful antivandalism or antigraffiti project is a committed group of volunteers. Once you have gathered volunteers to participate in your project and decided on your specific activities, you will need to provide some training.

Training will make sure that all participants understand the goals and objectives of your project, that they have the skills necessary to perform tasks, and that they know how to handle problems. Training also builds teamwork among your volunteers and develops the skills needed for the success of your project. You will need to plan such details as:

	When and where a training session will take place.
	Contents and procedures of a training session.
	What, if any, additional materials will be needed.

You may also need to enlist the help of such professionals as law enforcement officers, victim assistance professionals, school security staff, trainers from corporations, lawyers, and community volunteer agencies.

Be sure each specific part of the training is planned. This will do much to ensure the success of your effort. Professional trainers know that preparation and organization are 80 percent of good training. The table above is a guideline of training hours for an antivandalism project and other crime prevention projects.

Other Possible Projects

Here are some ideas for projects:

	Work with a Neighborhood Watch group to start a "square mile" or "block by block" program in which youth and others take responsibility for the cleanliness of an area and work with residents to maintain it. Youth in several major cities in England took on these challenges as summer projects.
	Write articles for the school newspaper on the cost of graffiti, its impact on the school budget, and how the courts -- juvenile and adult -- treat vandalism. Students in Hibbing and Chisholm, MN, wrote public service messages that were later broadcast on local radio stations.
	Start a hotline in cooperation with police and school officials to report vandalism. In some high schools, Crimestoppers, through its Scholastic Crimestoppers program, offers such services.
	Organize a graffiti cleanup crew. Immediately cleaning up graffiti whenever it appears helps the community look better and discourages further vandalism.

Youth In Action Bulletin

December 1998     Number 02