NEIGHBORHOODS SEEK FUNDS TO WIPE OUT GRAFFITI SCOURGE
Byline: By Ryan Konig, Staff writer
The sun rarely sets on graffiti in Linda Reinhart's neighborhood.
To help keep it that way, the neighborhood, near 87th Avenue and Indian School Road, applied for a new program that will give neighborhoods up to $10,000 to pay for self-improvement programs.
The neighborhood would buy a paint sprayer to help its team of volunteers who routinely look for and paint over graffiti.
More than 200 neighborhoods have applied and are requesting a total of about $1 million in grants. This year, however, an estimated $300,000 will be available.
The money comes from the Neighborhood Protection Ordinance -- a city sales tax increase that voters approved to pay for more police officers, firefighters and neighborhood programs.
The Neighborhood Protection Ordinance oversight committee is reviewing the applications and the grants will be awarded within the next few months.
Many neighborhoods requested grants to buy additional street lights, turn some streets into Cul-de-sacs and to pay for after-school programs for youths.
Richard Fox, committee chairman, as well as president of the Phoenix Block Watch Advisory Board, said the committee has begun reviewing the applications.
The committee's recommendations as to which grants should be approved will be forwarded to the City Council.
''One of the the main benefits of this money and this process is that it teaches people to become self-reliant, rather than a squeaky wheel or a burden on the city,'' Fox said.
Fox was among several Phoenix residents who organized the push for the Neighborhood Protection Ordinance and the program in which neighborhoods can apply for improvement grants.
Starting next year, the sales tax increase is expected to raise at least $600,000 annually for the neighborhood grants program.
Reinhart, who is president of the Ryan's Ridge Neighborhood Association, which includes about 160 homes, said the grant program will help neighborhoods improve themselves.