Friday, August 1, 2008

"There Are No Gangs In Uptown"

Vice Lord Nation graffiti dissing the Gangster Disciples, carved in the sidewalk on Winthrop. 311 has been contacted, and will be contacted again and again until this is removed.

This is the sort of thing we need to look out for and have removed when we see it, as part of making our neighborhood a safe and healthy one. Baby steps, but important and easy ones.

11 comments:

  1. Maybe someone should cover the carvings with paint (pink perhaps)

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  2. I'm always amazed with how determined they are. It seems that carving that into concrete would be loud and time-consuming, that someone would notice and stop them or alert authorities, but I guess they work skillfully and quickly.

    Yes, it should be immediately addressed with something - paint, chalking, etc. - before the city gets around to removing it!

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  3. is there blood spatter over it? or just regular debris?

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  4. I have been told in the past that it is pretty important to remove this kind of thing as soon as possible as it helps prevent it from happening again. I'm not sure why this would be and how much stock I should put in this line of information. In any case, who should be reporting this as sometimes grafitti is on a building and sometimes on public property? I would love to call 311 when I see this, but I'm not sure if it's my place.

    Anyone?

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  5. Hi Chuck, it's always your place to report something to 311. And not only that, it's your (and our) responsibility. It's more important to get the call logged and have it taken care of, then who actually logged the call or whether it was public or private property. When you call, you don't even have to leave your name so if you're concerned about calling, especially if it's gang-related, then that should allay those concerns.

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  6. we should be reporting any incident asap...for those who dont know, you can request 311 services online as well:
    http://egov.cityofchicago.org/city/webportal/portalDeptCategoryAction.do?BV_SessionID=@@@@0481086392.1217683995@@@@&BV_EngineID=cccfadeekjkiijjcefecelldffhdfif.0&deptCategoryOID=-536896082&contentType=COC_EDITORIAL&topChannelName=Dept&entityName=311+City+Services&deptMainCategoryOID=-536884534

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  7. Don't forget our 311 link under Useful links on the main page. Also Andy, we doubt they carved this in the sidewalk after it was hard, they surely did this when it was freshly poured.

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  8. Chuck, there used to be a requirement that only the owner could call in graffiti if private property got tagged, and the city had to wait a certain number of days to remove it if the owner didn't call it in.

    No more. Anyone can call it in.

    The city gives priority to hate messages and gang tags. When the place of worship on my street got tagged, that was also removed really quickly.

    I have a lot of issues with the way the city is run, but Graffiti Blasters rock!

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  9. since a tag is the way gangs lay claim to an area and issue challenges to rivals it is important to remove them quickly.

    It communicates that the neighborhoods belong to the residents, not the gangs.

    Also, it negates the possibility of rival gangs tagging back and lessons the incidence of rival gang conflicts as the gang 'claim' is removed.

    if you're really interested, more info on that sort of thing is at
    http://chicagogangs.org/

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  10. http://www.gaylords712.com/sungln.html

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