Graffiti crackdown fantastic but lets not forget the responsible retailers in Northland
Its great to see central Government cracking down on those that wantonly and recklessly inflict their trash on private property and in doing so attempt to drag our regions public face and into the dysfunctional cesspits that these people appear to wallow in.
We wonder about the wisdom in fining perpetrators $2000 for desecrating property when history has shown the NZ justice system only too willing to ‘write off’ fines of people once they rack up $30000 or more in fines.
Our solution is to ‘tag’ these people with their fines that follows them for life until they are no longer ‘drawing an income’ or earning a living with an amount extracted each week as reparation to society.
We must however point out that we have in Whangarei a group of businesses that are often overlooked by media, who have already taken measures to protect our community by signing up to a voluntary code of ethics proposed by the Northland Chamber last year.
Last year we asked retailers involved in the sale of ‘graffiti type material’ if they were doing anything and what they would be prepared to do to assist with this problem.
The following retailers (MITRE 10 Regent, Placemakers, Colourplus Kamo and Wynn Fraser paints) agreed various initiatives put forward by the Chamber to assist in the stem of sales of paint to taggers. Not only did these retailers agree on self imposed ethics but they had already put systems such as security, restricting sales Policies and a responsible attitude in pushing for a solution to stop the tagging scourge.
It is also interesting to note that these businesses have a local content in other words the franchise or business is owned locally and therefore have more than a financial stake in our community with most of the staff being local.
In last weeks announcement from Government one of the crackdowns was to impose fines of up to $1500 on businesses for not having special security arrangements in place. Once again Government has picked the ‘easy’ target, Business, to pick on when societies ills such as tagging appear on the agenda. Why should businesses be fined $1500 because your offspring or cousin can successfully steals spray paint from them?
The message is this. Support these businesses. They are run by people who by there creativity and initiative risk their capital to provide jobs and services to our community. They are also part of the most ‘compliance imposed upon’ groups in New Zealand and the ones that put back into your community in a various number of ways.
Its great to see central Government cracking down on those that wantonly and recklessly inflict their trash on private property and in doing so attempt to drag our regions public face and into the dysfunctional cesspits that these people appear to wallow in.
We wonder about the wisdom in fining perpetrators $2000 for desecrating property when history has shown the NZ justice system only too willing to ‘write off’ fines of people once they rack up $30000 or more in fines.
Our solution is to ‘tag’ these people with their fines that follows them for life until they are no longer ‘drawing an income’ or earning a living with an amount extracted each week as reparation to society.
We must however point out that we have in Whangarei a group of businesses that are often overlooked by media, who have already taken measures to protect our community by signing up to a voluntary code of ethics proposed by the Northland Chamber last year.
Last year we asked retailers involved in the sale of ‘graffiti type material’ if they were doing anything and what they would be prepared to do to assist with this problem.
The following retailers (MITRE 10 Regent, Placemakers, Colourplus Kamo and Wynn Fraser paints) agreed various initiatives put forward by the Chamber to assist in the stem of sales of paint to taggers. Not only did these retailers agree on self imposed ethics but they had already put systems such as security, restricting sales Policies and a responsible attitude in pushing for a solution to stop the tagging scourge.
It is also interesting to note that these businesses have a local content in other words the franchise or business is owned locally and therefore have more than a financial stake in our community with most of the staff being local.
In last weeks announcement from Government one of the crackdowns was to impose fines of up to $1500 on businesses for not having special security arrangements in place. Once again Government has picked the ‘easy’ target, Business, to pick on when societies ills such as tagging appear on the agenda. Why should businesses be fined $1500 because your offspring or cousin can successfully steals spray paint from them?
The message is this. Support these businesses. They are run by people who by there creativity and initiative risk their capital to provide jobs and services to our community. They are also part of the most ‘compliance imposed upon’ groups in New Zealand and the ones that put back into your community in a various number of ways.
The Northland Chamber of Commerce is the networking, education, advocacy and marketing group for Northland business, and is part of a nationwide network of 30 and a world-wide movement of 21,000 chambers. Subscription to the free fortnightly chamber e-news can be arranged on info@northchamber.co.nz. Enquiries to 09-4384771 or www.northchamber.co.nz, www.kaiparachamber.co.nz and www.farnorthchamber.co.nz
You can have a say on this by going to the Northland Chamber of Commerce Feedback website on www.northchamber.blogspot.com
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