Committee OKs Scaled-Back Restrictions on Spray Paint Cans

SACRAMENTO — An anti-graffiti bill that would outlaw portable spray paint cans narrowly cleared a state Senate hurdle Tuesday, but only after the author agreed to scale back the measure by reducing it to a test program in Southern California.

Facing stiff opposition from the nation’s paint industry, the bill by Sen. Quentin L. Kopp (I-San Francisco) was approved by the Senate Criminal Procedure Committee on a 4-2 vote, the bare minimum required.

Two Democrats, Sens. Diane Watson and Richard Polanco, who represent graffiti-defaced districts of Los Angeles, voted for the bill after Kopp met their demands to weaken the ban.

Under the compromise, the ban would be restricted to Los Angeles, Kern and all other counties south of the Tehachapis for a “regional pilot” project of unspecified duration. Unrestricted sales of aerosol spray paint cans would continue in the north.

Watson and Polanco, who represented swing votes on the committee, denounced graffiti vandalism at an earlier hearing, but voiced concern that a permanent statewide ban might result in the loss of paint industry jobs and aggravate the state’s recovering economy.

As a condition of their favorable votes, Kopp said he agreed to amend the bill later in the session so it would impose the ban as an experiment only in the southern region of the state. If it proved effective, a future Legislature could extend the prohibition statewide, he said.

The bill (SB1696) still faces action in the Appropriations Committee and on the Senate floor. If it wins Senate approval, the measure will find another round of opposition in the Assembly, where the new Republican majority is fiercely protective of business interests.

Under the bill, spray paint cans would be outlawed in Southern California effective Jan. 1, 2000, unless the spray mechanism can be activated only by a fixed power source, such as an electrical cord and outlet.

Tethering or otherwise restricting the portability of spray paint containers, Kopp and his supporters say, would prevent graffiti vandals from attacking public and private property.

Inventors have designed several spray activation mechanisms for aerosol cans, but none is available on the market. They claim that the devices would swiftly become available if the Legislature and Gov. Pete Wilson, in effect, created a market for them.

But representatives of the paint industry, including such big names as Sherwin Williams and Glidden, warned that legitimate consumers would be punished for the spray paint vandalism of a relatively small number of taggers. They contend that the bill would increase the cost of spray paint and argue that taggers would merely turn to alternatives such as fingernail and shoe polishes.