You won’t believe the news coming out of Oakland. But then again it’s California, so this is right up their alley of nonsense. A 102-year-old man in a wheelchair was told to clean the graffiti from his fence or face the consequences of fines. The man, named Victor Silva, has lived there for 80 years and he’s a taxpaying American, but the city doesn’t care. They’ll go after him for that fine money anyway!
He got a citation saying he had to clean the vandalism off his fence by a certain date or get fined $1100 and then $1277 for every time he fails the inspection after that. All of this for some graffiti that was done by a criminal, the same criminals that Oakland fails to do anything about. A crime news article on Yahoo had some quotes and other information from Victor Silva and his family:
“It was so absurd, it’s like a joke. If you drive around the city and see the graffiti everywhere, it’s just I don’t know what to say,” said daughter-in-law Elena Silva.
“…thought that somebody’s crazy,” said Silva Sr.
In his younger years before the wheelchair, he often painted over the graffiti himself.
“Just had a roller and a paintbrush and just painted it. It was very easy because I was a contractor, you know. I’ll be 103 in two months or so. That slowed it up a little bit, you know,” said Silva Sr.
Victor Silva Jr, 70, now does the cleaning. That’s the man’s son and it’s awesome that he’s 70 and still gets to spend time with his father. Most of us would love to have that experience too! The bad part is what Silva Jr. said about the vandalism. “It’s hard to keep up with it because as soon as we get it painted, It’s gonna be graffiti on it again, and it won’t last.”
Ironically, there’s a utility box up the street that was also vandalized. Who’s coming out to clean that? Are they getting the same treatment? Will they face fines if the graffiti isn’t cleaned off in a decent amount of time? How about putting some police on the streets to stop this madness? It’s a shame what the city of Oakland is doing to this man. He deserves better. After all, what’s his tax dollars going to if it’s not stopping crime?
