About a month ago I was in the bike lanes and saw a group of shady lookin' kids. One pulls out a spray can and aims it at the concrete near the McDougall Centre. I said "don't even think about it" and he says "oh, it's just chalk". "I don't care, it's not your property." and they kinda looked at me again and walked off. Success! Damn kids!
The Following 11 Users Say Thank You to Fuzz For This Useful Post:
About a month ago I was in the bike lanes and saw a group of shady lookin' kids. One pulls out a spray can and aims it at the concrete near the McDougall Centre. I said "don't even think about it" and he says "oh, it's just chalk". "I don't care, it's not your property." and they kinda looked at me again and walked off. Success! Damn kids!
Fuzz is not the Hero Calgary deserves...
__________________ The Beatings Shall Continue Until Morale Improves!
This Post Has Been Distilled for the Eradication of Seemingly Incurable Sadness.
The World Ends when you're dead. Until then, you've got more punishment in store. - Flames Fans
If you thought this season would have a happy ending, you haven't been paying attention.
Apparently you can't replace with acrylic cuz then vandals started lighting the panels on fire instead of smashing them when it was trialed at bus shelters in the past. So perforated metal panels might the way to go?
Honestly I don't understand why there are idiots like this. Asia doesn't have issues with smashed glass public art/shelters the way we have in Calgary. Though I guess places like Singapore do also have severe punishment for vandalism that includes huge fines, caning, and jail time which would be objected to here.
Finding the guy barely even matters. He's a vagrant. It's not like he'll be able to pay for the damage. He can't even pay a fine. So, what, we throw him in the slammer for 30 days?
That's it. Experiment over. Throw up some railings and call it a day. Calgarians can't handle the art project. Let's try again in 50 years. What a downer.
The Following 3 Users Say Thank You to Sliver For This Useful Post:
It sucks but due to cost, maybe we give up on the curved bottom panels and just replace them with flat ones that are cheap to replace or we can use that hammerglass on, etc.
Finding the guy barely even matters. He's a vagrant. It's not like he'll be able to pay for the damage. He can't even pay a fine. So, what, we throw him in the slammer for 30 days?
That's it. Experiment over. Throw up some railings and call it a day. Calgarians can't handle the art project. Let's try again in 50 years. What a downer.
Time needs to scale with damage caused, and it should be converted to hard labour, forced public service or something similar so the time isn't just a cake walk for repeat offenders. The steep punishments seem to work in other parts of the world.
The Following User Says Thank You to FlameOn For This Useful Post:
Apparently you can't replace with acrylic cuz then vandals started lighting the panels on fire instead of smashing them when it was trialed at bus shelters in the past. So perforated metal panels might the way to go?
Honestly I don't understand why there are idiots like this. Asia doesn't have issues with smashed glass public art/shelters the way we have in Calgary. Though I guess places like Singapore do also have severe punishment for vandalism that includes huge fines, caning, and jail time which would be objected to here.
They've released a video of him doing it now too
Spoiler!
The Following 3 Users Say Thank You to OptimalTates For This Useful Post:
Time needs to scale with damage caused, and it should be converted to hard labour, forced public service or something similar so the time isn't just a cake walk for repeat offenders. The steep punishments seem to work in other parts of the world.
lol, there's nothing you can get out of somebody who has nothing. It'd make you feel better to have some guy on the other side of 50 shoveling ditches as penance? Chop off his hands, maybe? IDK, I don't see that stopping some bum with mental health and substance abuse issues from misbehaving. Like, isn't that obviously completely pointless?
Anybody want to consider my warehousing-them-in-Airdrie strategy again? Like, how much are these guys costing us a month in Calgary? Tucking them away in Airdrie with three squares a day, some board games and a pen to play in seems like a win-win. You can have the "I'm here to get fataed up and die" warehouse including free drugs. You can have the "I'm sick and tired of living like a POS and would like to get help warehouse" - that would come with increased privileges tied to therapy, health and vocational progress. Then finally you could have the re-integration warehouse, which is really just an apartment-style building where we get them back on their feet and keep them pointed in the right direction. Fata up? Back to square one.
I really don't see how punishing a bum for smashing windows helps anything. Homeless and drugged out people can't navigate the square world most of us inhabit. We can't let them crash at the Mustard Seed for the night and expect that to go anywhere to solving any problems other than keeping a guy warm for one night. The problems are longer term and need better solutions.
Start treating them like children. Send them to their room (our warehouse) until they can calm themselves down (get clean/therapy) and turn over a new page.
Hate the plan if you want, but whatever the fata it is we're doing now across the western world is doing jack ####. Time for some tough love.
The Following User Says Thank You to Sliver For This Useful Post:
I think you do need to show some sort of public punishment. It may not help deter the homeless or the mentally ill, but it will at least warn others (ie. bored/angsty teenagers) that there are consequences, and demonstrates to your citizens that it is not acceptable to deface public property.
I think it's important to show that the little stuff matters (even if in this case, it's not small). Graffiti, littering, dog crap...it all adds up. Let it go and it erodes civic pride and encourages even worse behaviour. Let's not turn into San Francisco.
The Following 13 Users Say Thank You to Table 5 For This Useful Post:
I think you do need to show some sort of public punishment. It may not help deter the homeless or the mentally ill, but it will at least warn others (ie. bored/angsty teenagers) that there are consequences, and demonstrates to your citizens that it is not acceptable to deface public property.
I think it's important to show that the little stuff matters (even if in this case, it's not small). Graffiti, littering, dog crap...it all adds up. Let it go and it erodes civic pride and encourages even worse behaviour. Let's not turn into San Francisco.
Yes, but with a guy like this there are so few punishments that do anything. At most you just piss everyone off because how do you punish a guy with a net worth of $0 in a way that satisfies all of us who are footing the $750,000 bill? I agree he needs to be punished, as do all delinquents. So, sure, fine him the max (knowing he can't pay) and then put him in jail, I guess, for non-payment. Really, though, it's whack-a-mole. Another bum will pop up doing something else costly and ridiculous tomorrow. We need to be getting these guys off the streets. We can disagree with how that's done, but the problem is drugged out, mentally ill people living on river banks with nothing to do except cause problems.
Yes, but with a guy like this there are so few punishments that do anything. At most you just piss everyone off because how do you punish a guy with a net worth of $0 in a way that satisfies all of us who are footing the $750,000 bill? I agree he needs to be punished, as do all delinquents. So, sure, fine him the max (knowing he can't pay) and then put him in jail, I guess, for non-payment. Really, though, it's whack-a-mole. Another bum will pop up doing something else costly and ridiculous tomorrow. We need to be getting these guys off the streets. We can disagree with how that's done, but the problem is drugged out, mentally ill people living on river banks with nothing to do except cause problems.
I don't disagree with you, this behaviour goes deeper than just one homeless dude. Having said that, while we look to find ways to fix the root causes, I think it's still important to enforce the existing laws at the same time... especially when it's a relatively high profile defacement of property.
