Relief for a scrawling metropolis: graffiti removers unpaint the town; some have a blast.

Relief for a scrawling metropolis

Graffiti removers unpaint the town; some have a blast

When the messages spray-painted on your building get too ugly, you can call the Graffiti Patrol. If you want a more clinical sounding name, there's always Ed the Graffiti Doctor. Or how about Graffiti Prevention Systems?

The three are the vanguard of a fledgling but burgeoning industry that's springing up in the path of spray paint-wielding vandals in Los Angeles. Each morning in business neighborhoods throughout L.A., squads of workers from these young companies carry paint and high pressure water-blasting equipment into battle against the graffiti guerillas of the night before.

None of them can guarantee to prevent graffiti, of course, because a determined graffitist can outwit even the most vigilant anti-graffiti squads. But for a fee, these new specialists of the L.A. business world can rub out graffiti before it spreads.

Just ask Mitch Uberstine, vice president of general services for First Federal Bank of California. Uberstine's bank building, which sits across the street from Fairfax High School, was getting plastered with graffiti regularly until it contracted with Graffiti Prevention Systems, a Granada Hills-based company that has been in the business for about three years.

"It's made a big difference for us," Uberstine commented. "The graffiti is less frequent and I attribute this to one thing: The people know as soon as they put it on we take it off."

Graffiti is bad for business for all kinds of reasons. It makes office buildings hard to rent, drives customers away from retail shops, and can drive would-be buyers, refinancers or insurance carriers away. For those reasons, paying to have graffiti removed -- like trash and gardening services -- is becoming just another cost of doing business in Los Angeles. Removing graffiti is an L.A. growth industry because graffiti, like weeds, has a proclivity for springing back up after it is obliterated.

Graffiti Patrol, based in L.A.'s Miracle Mile district, originated when founder Richard Ritz tired of graffiti marring the buildings he managed. Ritz hired workers to visit the properties each week and paint over the graffiti.

Then it occurred to Ritz that other property management firms must also be suffering from graffiti attacks, and he began advertising his service under the name Graffiti Patrol. For $99.95 a month the Graffiti Patrol makes weekly visits to buildings owned by its contracted clients to stamp out graffiti with a fresh coat of paint. Business has approximately doubled in the last six months and Graffiti Patrol now has close to 50 regular clients, including the Hancock Park Homeowners Association and several clients in Koreatown, Ritz says.

Ed the Graffiti Doctor got its start six months ago when Ed Ouellette, a professional painter for 40 years, started marketing his graffiti-removal services under the medical moniker. He started the Hollywood-based business after learning that graffiti busting was in demand.

"A lot of people started asking me to (remove graffiti)," Ouellette said. "So I started to advertise myself."

Ernest Garrett, co-proprietor of Graffiti Prevention Systems, says the company is an offshoot of Hi-Pressure Systems Inc., which has been in the business of cleaning buildings since the early 1970s by blasting them with hot water under high pressure. While under contract with the city of Los Angeles to clean sidewalks along the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the company was asked to also banish any graffiti it detected. As the need for graffiti removal services flourished citywide, Hi-Pressure Systems created the Griffiti Systems Prevention division.

Garrett says one trick of the graffiti-removal trade is to act swiftly. Graffitists take a certain amount of pride in their work, he says, so they will stay away from buildings where their creations are erased quickly and thoroughly. Like car thieves, they take the path of least resistance and go for the easy mark.

Ritz says graffitists often are gang members who spray buildings in their turf in the same way dogs and wolves spray theirs.

Removers and their clients agree that the more you remove graffiti, the less often you get hit by repeat offenses. But the incidence of defacement by graffiti is spreading beyond its already overwhelming proportions, according to city, county and state government sources.

Property owners in many neighborhoods have chosen to passively coexist, rather than fight graffiti artists. Ritz laments that graffiti removal is still a hard sell because of widespread apathy among landowners and property managers who consider graffiti an insurmountable problem. Others deem graffiti a law enforcement problem and refuse to accept that they must pay a monthly fee to rid their buildings of the telltale signs of vandalism, Ritz says.

Garrett says Graffiti Prevention Systems has encountered some trouble selling its service because of a proliferation of phonies who couldn't deliver on their promises. But he is finding less resistance these days.

"There's something very appealing about reducing their graffiti problems," he explains.

Ritz also thinks attitudes are changing.

"Two or three years ago no one paid to have graffiti removed," he says. "More people are coming around to the idea of paying for something that they never had to pay for before. The psychology is difficult."

Ouellette reports that he has drummed up business by training his sales efforts on properties where "pride of ownership" is already evident.

Once clients have tried their services, graffiti removers claim, they rarely go back to putting up with graffiti.

Lionel Sanders, who owns two buildings on the Westside, says one of his neighbors is riddled with graffiti while his building has pretty much been left alone since he signed up with Graffiti Prevention Systems.

Peter Gates, treasurer of the Hancock Park Homeowners Association, enlisted Graffiti Patrol to keep the neighborhood graffiti-free. Gates says he is now encouraging nearby neighborhoods to do the same.

Sam Kahn, proprietor of a Sherman Oaks-based property management firm, says graffiti removal is an "extremely high priority" for his company.

Vincent Ortolano, manager of Graffiti Patrol, says some of his clients are so intent on keeping their buildings clean they will ask him to return hours after he has painted over graffiti.

"Some clients will go a month without graffiti, or longer," Ortolano says. "They still keep us because they know as soon as they neglect the problem it will come back."

Like others who fight criminal behavior, graffiti removers occasionally find themselves exposed to danger. Ortolano said he has had beer bottles thrown at him in East Los Angeles and was told by gang members to leave a South Central job site immediately or be shot. As a matter of policy, Ortolano said his crew immediately folds up and leaves any job when confronted by danger.

Garrett said Graffiti Prevention Systems uses the same policy. But he says the graffitists rarely appear in the light of day to defend their work.