About a dozen residents volunteered for Englewood’s June 13 graffiti paint-out project.

Toni Geier, police community relations specialist, briefed the volunteers, provided the materials and the volunteers divided into two groups to search out and paint over graffiti.

This was a special event for Tyler Fee because he used to be one of the taggers who put up the graffiti he was now helping to eradicate.

“I did tagging for a while but, when I got busted, I decided not to do it any more,” he said with a smile.

He said he now views tagging and graffiti as chicken scratching that is done without thought to the damage being caused to private property.

He joined Lisa Johnson and other volunteers checking for graffiti in the north end of the alley between Broadway and Lincoln. They found some graffiti on utility boxes and some on buildings.

She said she learned about the graffiti paint-out while attending the Englewood Citizen’s Academy, a program to help inform residents about how the police do their job of serving the community.

“I feel graffiti is a big problem but we are finding less of it than I expected,” Johnson said.

Geier agreed the graffiti was less than she expected to find.

“Because bad weather seemed to pop up every time we scheduled an event, this is the first graffiti paint-out we have been able to have in more than six months so I expected we’d be pretty busy today,” Geier said with a big smile. “But, I’m happy to say we haven’t found a lot of graffiti in the alleys.”

The Folsoms made the graffiti a family affair as Steve, Brenda and their daughter Ashley volunteered for the project.

“This is our first time to volunteer for this project,” said Ashley, 16. “We did it because we wanted to help Englewood look better and because we like to help Toni with her projects.”

She said it makes her feel good to do something for her community and plans to join the project again.

Her mom Brenda said volunteering for the project was Ashley’s idea and the rest of the family came along because they felt it was good to work together to help their community.

Steve Folsom, Ashley’s dad, agreed.

“It’s great we can do this as a family. It’s good for the family and we are doing something good for our town,” he said. “We are having fun and I recommend more families join the project next time.”