Sign vandalism continues to be a problem during Calgary’s 2017 municipal election. One candidate is trying to find his missing signs, while another is defending hers.
Residents in the community of McKenzie Towne woke up to an election slogan saying “Vote 4 Teresa Hargreaves” on public sidewalks in the area this weekend.
“We thought it was vandalism,” resident Margee Hadley said. “Never seen that before. We’ve seen signs where they’re not supposed to be, but never anything on the sidewalk.”
Resident Tony Llewellyn is concerned by the political strategy — which used what looked like spray paint.
“I’m extremely surprised. I thought it was kids but it looks too neat for that,” Llewellyn said. “Find someone to get rid of it.”
It turns out, it’s not paint and Hargreaves was the one who encouraged it. She said “there’s been a complaint that there’s been some graffiti in the area, which is untrue.”
“We did a call for volunteers to help us with our campaign and a lot of the children and young adults and teenagers thought it would be great to do sidewalk chalk and some of the older children have done sidewalk chalk paint,” Hargreaves said.
Hargreaves said it’s not permanent and will wash off.
“If it’s still there after the election, we’ll make sure it’s gone.”
Hargreaves isn’t the first candidate to take their campaign onto the street — literally. She said she got the idea from mayoral incumbent Naheed Nenshi’s campaign from years ago.
“Mayor Nenshi did it with the very first election in 2013. When I was walking downtown I saw a lot of “Vote for Nenshi” with sidewalk chalk at the time, so that’s where some of the idea came from,” Hargreaves said.
The City of Calgary bylaw states “while technically chalk drawings on sidewalks would be considered graffiti, the city does not enforce the bylaw for children’s chalk drawings on sidewalks or other forms of children’s play.”
There’s nothing specific to chalk paint or politically motivated art but another City of Calgary bylaw states “art installations for community events require permits.”
The City says each case is different and that a peace officer would have to assess the chalk and situation accordingly.
Meanwhile, in the community of Richmond/Knob Hill, someone swiped more than 150 of Ward 8 incumbent Evan Woolley’s signs from front lawns.
“About two full truckloads were dumped at Stanley Park. It is very clear that this is a coordinated, concerted effort. They would have needed tools and trucks to remove these signs,” Woolley said. “There’s dozens of screws in these (big signs) that they’ve unscrewed.”
The thief was even caught on one home surveillance video that shows a person taking a lawn sign in the middle of the night.
Woolley says it undermines the democratic process.
“It’s really disappointing,” he said. “We’ve ran this campaign on a platform of ideas of things that we want to undertake in this city. This represents hundreds of hours of volunteer time.”
The Calgary election is less than a week away. Polls close Monday, Oct. 16 at 8 p.m.