DETROIT – Commissioned artwork adorns buildings in Detroit's Eastern Market, but spray-painted graffiti is marring that artwork and bringing complaints from merchants in the area.
The graffiti has been showing up on signs, doors, building artwork, even on traffic cones.
Dan McCarthy, owner of Cost Plus Wine Shoppe, said there is a noticeable difference between the work of the real artists and the vandalism of taggers.
"Look at the difference in art and junk. If you want to write your name on the side of building, write on the side of your house," McCarthy said. "Don't come down here and do it."
McCarthy said he and other business owners are being ticketed by the city if the graffiti is not taken down.
"Why should we be given tickets by the city. It's kind of crazy. It's not blight, It's not something we control," McCarthy said. "We remove it and clean it and it's back up there again."
Artists from Germany were hired to beautify the buildings with artwork this summer, but taggers have gone so far as to write their tags on top of the artwork.
McCarthy and other business owners suggest the taggers be rounded up and do the work of cleaning up the mess they made.