Second inner city wall gets tag free treatment and environment message

A second inner city alleyway wall was branded with an environmental quote today as part of Rotorua District Council (RDC) and Keep Rotorua Beautiful's ‘Absolutely Tag Free’ project.
The wall on Hinemoa Street, near City Focus, now features the quote, "Take pride in the environment, take pride in our community, take pride in yourself". The quote is by local recycling advocate, Marcello Ojerio.

When Mr Ojerio was approached by the council’s KRB coordinator Rose Hiha-Agnew to come up with a quote for the wall he said he went for a bike ride in the forest to think about it.

“I didn’t want to just come up with a recycling-based quote because it’s so one dimensional. If it was going to be in town, I wanted to tie the environment in with our community and individuals. That’s where change comes from.

“You choose to take pride. It’s something we can all do. You have to go out and create the positive change. I basically wanted to come up with a quote that would prompt people to think. If they start thinking, they will act differently.”

St Chads Charitable Trust volunteers painted the wall during the recent Scrub Day activities in preparation for the quote’s application, with St Chads’ manager James Leigh saying it was good to be involved with the project.

“It was a good atmosphere and we enjoyed painting the wall.”

St Chads’ client Barry Hall said he also enjoyed painting the wall and liked how it turned out.

RDC Inner City Revitalisation lead Portia McKenzie said the ‘Absolutely Tag Free’ project aims to revitalise inner city walls often targeted by vandals.

“The quotes give a vibrant, colourful appearance to walls in the inner city. The more tags a wall gets, the more likely these walls will have repeat offenders. The goal is that by adding quotes we can lessen the impact of tagging on our inner city walls.”

The first tag free wall was painted in a Pukuatua St alleyway next to Ronnies Cafe with the environmental message "Be the solution, not the pollution".

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