Brickbat: Forget It, Jake…

In Oakland, California's Chinatown neighborhood, business owners are facing thousands of dollars in fines from the city for graffiti on their properties. Shirley Luo, manager of Won Kee Supermarket, owes $3,000—including late fees—for not cleaning up graffiti fast enough. Despite efforts to paint over the tags, taggers keep returning, leaving merchants feeling unfairly penalized as victims of vandalism they can't control. The city requires property owners to remove graffiti quickly, calling it a public nuisance, but offers no financial help. Local leaders, including the Oakland Chinatown Improvement Council, are pushing the city to focus on catching taggers instead of fining businesses.