2 spray-paint incidents overnight under investigation

Two spray-paint incidents overnight are being dealt with this morning. Both carried messages about West Seattle High School. One incident involved spray paint at the school – after receiving a report about it, we photographed it on a low concrete wall and sidewalk on the west (parking lot) side of the school. (The actual writing is blurred in our published photos, per WSB policy.) WSHS principal Ruth Medsker says Seattle Public Schools crews have since removed it. “Our security is working on determining who is responsible. We have some leads. … We have not called the police as of now, but it is not out of the question.”

The other incident is in the same spot that gets painted every year about this time – the SW Charlestown hill west of 45th SW. Last year found commenters debating “tradition or vandalism?”. This year, we heard about it via a commenter who claims that neighbors captured it on hidden cameras and will go to police with the visuals unless it’s removed. We went over for a look. The road surface is indeed newly painted with multiple colors. Spray paint cans are still in the planting strip on the north side:

The stop sign at the bottom of the hill was painted too:

After we went by, a neighbor called and claimed there’s paint on some private property as well, including a fence. They had not yet reported it to police. Regarding the road and the sign, we are waiting to hear back from SDOT to see what their plans are.

ADDED 4:56 PM: From Marybeth Turner at SDOT:

SDOT Street Maintenance supervisors looked at the street painting on SW Charlestown and 45th/ 47th SW today. They removed the paint cans and determined that the street is safe to drive on. To conserve resources in the event that more painting occurs, they will wait until school is out and then clean the street.

Street Maintenance notified the community police team and asked them to keep an eye out for any further vandalism.

westseattlegrl June 17, 2011 (11:05 am)

directly across California from McDonald’s (near WSHS), there were 2 blonde girls that spent quite a bit of time taking pictures of each other with something on the sidewalk. i wonder if this the same thing. it was about 8pm last night. they were their for awile and then took off running south.

Neighbor June 17, 2011 (11:17 am)

Why wouldn’t the school call in the police? This is costing the taxpayers money that could be used for other things, like educating these little #%^&*. Blanksy it ain’t. It’s something immature children do for attention, give it to them in the form of a visit from SDP.

ummm June 17, 2011 (11:20 am)

Recent graduates painted a road, better send em to jail! Come on people.

sc June 17, 2011 (11:26 am)

I live near the “Charlestown Hill”. Since rain is predicted for this Saturday and Sunday, I’ll get to hear how many people need new tires as they try to go up the hill, which will now be made slick by the combination of paint and rain! Where are my earplugs?

hopey June 17, 2011 (12:46 pm)

Hey ummm – remember this?
https://westseattleblog.com/2011/01/power-outage-in-west-seattle-2
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Scroll down to see photos of the completely totaled car. Both driver and passenger had life-threatening injuries and needed to be treated at Harborview.
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The hill these kids painted overnight is THE SAME HILL where this accident occurred.
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What do you think the result would have been if someone driving recklessly had flown across the top of that hill while the kids were on the street painting?
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It’s a very dangerous spot in general. Too dangerous for kids to be goofing around in the middle of the night. But I suppose they’ll keep doing it until one of their peers gets killed, because the “community” doesn’t want to hold the kids accountable.

Mike June 17, 2011 (1:10 pm)

Painting the hill is not exactly ‘ok’ but I think a fine and cleanup duty for those that did it would be good enough punishment. As for the private property and Stop sign being painted, I think if they’re 18 years old they should spend some nice time with the police, if they’re underage then their parents can enjoy losing a lot of money to restore the Stop sign and repay the owners of private property for damages. I know if my property got tagged and I found out who had done it, they’d be enjoying time in front of a judge.

ST June 17, 2011 (1:20 pm)

Having lived at the bottom of the hill, I can attest to the fact that the painting does make it much more slick even with out rain. The city was out few years back and removed most of that years paint.

liz d June 17, 2011 (2:33 pm)

just saw the back of an RV on my way home to Alki on Harbor, with the same orange paint, and I thought that is too bad, can’t we leave people’s private property alone? I hope they find who did it and make them clean it up.

Cami June 17, 2011 (2:50 pm)

I think they’ve been painting that hill for decades… anyone know exactly how long? It was a bit messier this year.

Bob Padgett June 17, 2011 (4:41 pm)

You guys are all rediculous. Get a life and stop stressing about the little things. It’s a TRADITION!!! they have been doing it every year since 1910. Get over it. Honestly I think it’s beautiful art work and it gives the community a lot more character, just like the U district where there are shoes hanging from trees and graffiti showing how proud they are of there school colors and etc. This is the same situation, except it’s in west Seattle where people have a lot more STUCK UP personalitys. And I’m sure I can get a lot more to agree. Good job class of 2011, I totally support your art work.

Gina June 17, 2011 (4:42 pm)

The hill has been painted at least since 1973 in my memory. The WSHS class of 1969 tagged the Lafayette playground pretty completely back in the day.

Martha June 17, 2011 (5:14 pm)

I think it’s a cool tradition as long as it’s just on the street. I’ve never had any trouble in my car from the paint making it slippery. I live right by there, btw, and I’m fine with it.

Dean June 17, 2011 (5:22 pm)

Bob P. Says it’s Ok man, it’s cool to paint up streets! Hey then let’s have a big ceremony next year and all get together and do some vandalizing. Stuck up – I don’t think so – maybe just educated. Maybe next year they can paint up Bob’s driveway and make that a new “tradition”.

Dc June 17, 2011 (7:52 pm)

Taggers = Scumbags

JN June 17, 2011 (8:31 pm)

Hey, if these punks want to vandalize public property, they must be okay with someone else tagging their private property, right?

ummm June 17, 2011 (9:27 pm)

Hopey- So then stake out the hill on grad night and call the cops when teens are putting themselves in danger.

Dean- That is ridiculous. “Educated” has nothing to do with painting a hill. There were frat guys at Yale chanting “No means yes, yes means anal!” this year. They’re educated. What do you have to say about them? Stick to the point at hand.

Beth June 17, 2011 (9:48 pm)

Neighbor, you couldn’t have said it better~

datamuse June 17, 2011 (10:32 pm)

Yanno, if you can’t advance a better reason for doing something than “We’ve always done this,” it might be worth asking whether there’s any point in continuing.

KCH June 18, 2011 (1:11 am)

I live right on the hill. Does my family and I like having to look at the graffiti for months every time we go leave our driveway? No, but I do understand this is a long standing tradition and I do get what it is like to be excited to graduate school and be young. Honestly, I wish Banksy would have some children go thru West Seattle High – if only to improve the quality of the graffiti on the hill (it is pretty low grade, no? ;). Maybe the art program funding at the High school is too low?

Seriously tho – I wish that the individual(s) that decided to spray paint one of our trees as well as some pavers orange on our property; tagged the neighbor’s fence across the street would have refrained from doing so. It is pretty lame and over time repeating this will only erode my being reasonably cool about all of this.

KCH June 18, 2011 (1:13 am)

Other thoughts on this… I wonder if we could have a large rock installed along the hillside that could be painted in place of the road? I have seen this done in other communities. Perhaps this could keep the tradition alive, while keeping the kids safe and out of a very blind and busy road. Alternatively, what if washable paint was supplied to the kids (similar to what is used for the St. Patty’s Day green line that gets painted down 4th Ave)? Just a a thought. I think we can work something out and would love to hear from others – ideas…

BTW TR – My wife, son and I cleaned up all of the paint cans and litter, not SDOT. We did the same last year ;). I also stopped a couple of teens from spray painting my neighbors driveway today. After they claimed that, “they were just seeing if there was any paint left in the can”. I told them that tagging private property was incredibly lame – they agreed and moved on.

TCH June 18, 2011 (7:45 am)

I walked through WS HS yesterday The wording was unpleasant and violent. I have seen various yearly traditions in other places where each year the class paints just their class year in a certain place. The WS tagging did not seem part of a fun tradition. It looked like common street thugs doing vandalism.

tgod June 18, 2011 (11:31 am)

haters gonna hate. they’re just having fun. quit being cry babies.

NotMe June 18, 2011 (3:54 pm)

ok, everyone grab some paint and head to “tgod’s” place! We are gonna have some fun!

Tgod June 20, 2011 (12:25 pm)

We sure will have some fun! Bring blue yellow and orange paint!
You all are some uptight, wanna be Bellevueites by having a damn stick up your A$$.
Don’t you think if the police wanted to bust every single senior who painted the hill, they would? But they didn’t. They know it’s tradition. They don’t care enough to ruin a graduates life by something that happens year after year. I don’t see or hear of any people taking action themselves. You KNOW it’s goingto be done around the time of WS’s graduation. Why don’t YOU PEOPLE WHO ARE COMPLAINING sit at Charlestown til 3 or 4 in the morning and stop the artists-to-be? B*tching on this website isn’t gonna make anything better. So next year why don’t you turn your annoying, pointless, complains into actions and stop it for yourselves?
And by the way, I don’t hear about ANYONE complaining about the hill they paint right by Seattle Lutheran… Hmmmm. Could this be just the private school hussies complaining because their poor mercedez or beamer might get a little paint on it?

DB June 20, 2011 (2:06 pm)

Come on really? if your cars tires cant handle like 1 foot sections of paint you need new tires anyways. Its always been done because they are proud of what they accomplished I have talked to people that live on the hill and they really don’t care. If you think this is SUCH A BAD THING your obviously not from West Seattle.. And half of the cops in West Seattle probably painted the hill when they graduated too. I guarantee these kids were not thugs or punks just graduates carrying out tradition most of their parents part took in also.. just get over your selves huh?

wshs June 20, 2011 (2:29 pm)

Dang all of you can’t quit 8itchin6? I’m sure its just a little school spirit you act like yourselfs weren’t young at once worry about your own business people come on now.

KCH June 20, 2011 (8:51 pm)

@DB – I live right on the hill and this is literally at the end of my driveway. Have we talked as you claimed that we have? I don”t recall it. I mentioned in an earlier post that my issues are not so much with the painting on the street as they are with private property damaged (we now have an orange cherry tree and pavers) I also don’t really like having to pick up the spray cans and paint littered everywhere. Am I being unreasonable? I do not think that I am. FYI – An SPD officer did stop by and asked me if I knew who was responsible. So they are looking for names and will make arrests. I didn’t give them any. I don’t personally think any kid’s future is worth messing up over this, so I didn’t comment other than to say I was disappointed that they sprayed and littered on my property. SDOT also came by and flagged me down for questioning. They plan to sand/sweep/wash the paint off soon – at the tax payers’ expense.

Sorry, comment time is over.