Teen taggers get chance to clean up mess

PAYSON — Payson Mayor Burtis Bills isn't impressed by the spray-painted initials, signatures or bubble-like letters on buildings, walls or boxcars.

"It isn't art," Bills said.

And he would know. Bills has been teaching art at Payson Junior High School for more than 30 years. He's heard the argument that graffiti writers, as they like to be called, are simply exercising their freedozm of expression, and he wholeheartedly disagrees.

"It's vandalism, pure and simple," Bills said.

Payson is one of Utah County's trouble spots when it comes to graffiti, which sometimes is associated with gang activity. The city is also part of Teens Against Graffiti (TAG), a countywide community service work program in which youths in the juvenile court system can take responsibility for their choices and improve their communities.

For the past 10 years, 4th District Juvenile Court in Provo has worked with Utah County cities and law enforcement agencies to battle the graffiti problem.

Under the program's "restorative justice" model, youths who are referred to the juvenile court and ordered to community service are assigned to do so in their own communities, said Shelly Waite, program coordinator for 4th District Juvenile Court.

"So American Fork youths clean up American Fork," Waite said, "and it's the same in every city."

Sometimes, she said, they even clean up their own messes. One of the supervised cleanup crews is made up of youths who are in the juvenile court system for vandalism or graffiti-related offenses.

"They were out doing the tagging, and they're now cleaning up the sites that they've tagged," Waite said. "That's a very interesting process to have the actual offenders caught, gone through the court and now back working with us cleaning up the graffiti they created."

In 2005, the program completed nearly $30,000 worth of graffiti cleanup at 465 sites, she said. "We hope we're making a difference," Waite said.

TAG is part of the 4th District Juvenile Court's work service program, Helping Offenders Perform Excellent Service (HOPES), which in December 1995 was honored by the U.S. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention for exceptional achievement in juvenile justice.

"You're talking about 23 cities and a county collaborating and working for the benefit of the youths," Waite said. "That's huge."

Provo, Orem and Payson are the areas with the highest gang- and graffiti-related activity, she said, but the program receives referrals from all over the county.