UPDATE: Tuesday, December 9 at 1:30 p.m.: The Department of Sanitation confirmed to Upper West Side Councilmember Gale Brewer’s office that it cleaned 20 locations in the neighborhood on Monday, where the “Smoke” graffiti appeared.
The agency said its team will be out again along Columbus Avenue on Tuesday to see if there’s more.
By Gus Saltonstall
If you frequent Columbus Avenue on the Upper West Side, there is a good chance you have noticed one of the many dozen examples of the word “Smoke” recently graffitied onto storefronts and buildings.
The graffiti was tagged on multiple facades along the avenue at some point at the end of last week.
“Any news about the SMOKE graffiti that has come up on Columbus for 8 streets in a row,” Jon, who did not provide his last name, asked West Side Rag in an email.
Upper West Side Councilmember Gale Brewer also took note of the new neighborhood graffiti, and penned a letter Monday to the New York Police Department and New York City Department of Sanitation about the issue.
“I write to bring to your attention to an outbreak of graffiti – “SMOKE” – on almost EVERY storefront on the west side of Columbus Avenue and other streets. I saw dozens of SMOKE tags today from 96 Street to 72 Street, but it likely exists elsewhere as well,” Brewer wrote. I am urging NYPD to apprehend the person or persons who are defacing structures with this tag. I also urge DSNY, the MTA, and USPS to remove the SMOKE tags as soon as possible.”
The Department of Sanitation told Brewer that they would look into the issue on Monday, according to her office.
The New York Police Department did not immediately respond to the Rag’s request for comment.
As of Monday, the Rag counted six examples of the word ‘Smoke” still up on the west side of Columbus Avenue from 70th to 76th streets.
We will update this story, if we learn more.
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Just remember SMOKE, don’t admit to anything verbally or in writing. Your first name is Lawyer and your last name is Lawyer, and your address is Lawyer!
The delusion in offering legal advice to this clown is only matched by the delusion that anyone is ever getting arrested, or even questioned, for this.
Seriously.. while it’s generally good advice for anyone in any interaction with the police whatsoever… I don’t get Claire’s agenda here, nor the currently 10 upvotes they got. This is garbage, it’s visual litter, it’s lame graffiti by someone trashing our community rather than offering literally anything of value with their social deviation. It isn’t art, it isn’t some grandiose statement, it isn’t appealing in any way – yet they seem to think we all need to be forcefully subjected to it dozens of times anyway. No. Smoke needs to gtfo and make up for this nonsense with time served in some capacity. If it’s a first offense then maybe some community service cleaning up other literal garbage would be a useful perspective for them to see why trashing things is disrespectful
New York ain’t for everyone
This is not even good tagging. No artistry or creativity. Lazy work. Quantity over quality. Should do time for being lame. At least some of these guys put some effort in.
Well put. Super basic. Super lame.
Lousy letterspacing.
It’s a steady decline on the UWS. There are signals everywhere and everyday that you do not need to obey the law or considerate other people as fellow residents of a community. It has become do whatever you want, whenever you want as long as you think it is ok. This is the result
You want to go back to the UWS of 30 years ago when there were crack vials in the gutter on every street, cars broken into every night, sounds of gunfire? I don’t.
Mmmmm…I’ve lived on West 79th for nearly 50 years. This has never been the case in the immediate blocks around my building.
Stop watching the news, go outside, and walk around.
In the past there was never any graffiti in New York City.
Seriously? Graffiti is as old as people, why would NYC ever have been any different?
Guessing he was being sarcastic.
I really feel bad for you. Every day the same doomsaying comments over and over. The city just went 12 days without a murder cheer up a bit. It’s graffiti.
Restaurants full. New shops opening nearly every street, a new theater opening soon, more films shot here every week, kids and parents laughing down to the playgrounds, holiday decorations glowing…walk the blocks. This place is gold on the way to platinum.
I’m note sure which part of the UWS you are in but would suggest you take a walk up Bway, Amsterdam and/or Columbus north of 86th. Even better north of 96 street as that’s were some of the real uws still is
I live at 108th, my neighborhood is bright and active and things are opening up and lots of kids being kid-like after school in the streets and lots of families and dogs and folks yelling into their phones and guys on chairs outside bodegas or the senior center talking to their buddies. All the signs of a dynamic vibrant neighborhood. Where do you live, that you are seeing otherwise?
Yes alive and well on 92 street too with crowded shops and busting Jacob’s Pickles.
If by theater, you mean the old metro its not viable. They got millions from taxpayers, city & state. To buy it. The need aprox 29 million, with a 2030 date and are expecting more millions to come from our local electeds. There is no way the can make the $$$ they need to stay open with several theaters that seat about 250. Odds are the nonprofit will ask for a bailout from our electeds. For all the wealthy folks on its board maybe they should tap their friends and not soak taxpayers for a vanity project
I see the same thing. We’ll always have chicken littles.
Are we talking about the global warming folks now?
It’s called Climate Change.
Many restaurants are empty and closing. There are tons of vacant store fonts, especially in the 90’s, and 100’s. Crime is on the rise. A theatre may open in three years.
False, false, and false. You may want to change the sources you use.
And many opening! Restaurants always open and close, it’s a super risky business.
Yes, Bill, The world is coming to an end. Never before have see seen graffiti on our buildings. It’s surely a sign of the apocalypse.
I’m inclined to think that if there’s no scaffolding … it allows those with no brains and certainly anyone with zero interest in aesthetics to have a go at making the neighborhood look more ugly than anyone may have ever thought possible … On and on it goes! Sad that the UWS is becoming such a total dump.
Guessing you’ll be leaving the UWS soon?
I’m sure the poor darling(s) who did this have had difficult lives. We should pity them. I’m sure they are absolute sweethearts.
…but I agree, SMOKE is a lame tag.
SMOKE should be DONE. What happened to that guy anyway?
I’m sure whoever did this is looking at some serious time if they are apprehended.
This is surely a sarcastic comment!
You are correct.
People are always nostalgic for the NYC of the ’70s and ’80s until something like this ends up on their place. I don’t know if the ‘affordability’ is coming back but for sure the other stuff is.
Where there’s Smoke there’s satire
I, for one, am taking the tagger’s advice.
That fact that Gale Brewer is after this person sounds like a punchline to a WSR audience.
One of the problems with the UWS leadership is that they immediately look to large city wide organizations like DSNY to remove graffiti like this. She is an elected leader with a budget, people, and organizational capabilities. This could have been solved for $20 worth of cleaner spray and some rags but it is easier to complain loudly, hold a press conference, and thump your chest about how disappointed you are. It is time for “local” elected officials to be held accountable for making a difference, and not just being a megaphone to help us reach large city organizations.
Isn’t that what she was elected to do? Sounds like (in this case) she’s doing what she was elected to do.
Strikes me as extremely unlikely that this wasn’t caught on camera (like, a dozen times) given how many cameras the NYPD has pointed at every nook and cranny of the streets.
But no one vandalized any of the personal cars the detectives have strewn all over the sidewalks around the precinct, so why would they investigate vandalization?
In other crime news:
“New York City has tied its record for the longest stretch without a homicide in recorded history. The city went 12 calendar days — Nov. 25 to Dec. 7 — without a homicide, according to New York Police Department data.
During the first 11 months of the year, New York City saw its lowest number of shooting incidents (652) and shooting victims (812) in recorded history, according to NYPD data.
For the month of November, murders were also at the lowest level ever, with 16 murders, tying the previous record set in 2018.”
https://abcnews.go.com/US/new-york-city-ties-record-longest-stretch-without-homicide/story?id=128207753
I’ll take our city council member complaining about a few pieces of graffiti as a sign of success rather than failure and disorder. When shootings are at record lows we can afford to focus on smaller issues.
But these Citizen-obsessed lemmings see every reported alleged crime and think the world is coming to an end. Amazing that people are so myopic.
Oh Gale. An “outbreak of graffiti”? This is what you want NYPD to focus on? SMOKE is such a lame tag, and it’s not even artistically done. It’s just stupid.
This is just terrible. Just makes the area look a mess. I knew nothing good comes from these smoke and pot shops.
Yeah, because before they arrived, there was never any graffiti or crime. SMH.
Are you actually an impossibly crotchety old man shaking his cane at the heavens, or do you just play one in this comment section?
Hah!!!
Art is in the eye of the beholder. Basquiat’s graffiti tags SAMO, having must less artistry and creativity and letters than our SMOKE artist, are now pieces of fine art that hang in museums. a SAMO tag on a tarp recently sold at auction for $72 thousand.
Hey Smoke, stop defacing public property and put your tag on some tarps and take them to auction.
Ain’t no SAMO
I have to laugh. I thought folks considered graffiti “urban art” But if it’s on your building or in your area and you have to pay for the and/or clean it up yourself it’s a problem.
NYPD has to see them do it and by the way our local ecteds got it and many other quality of life crimes decriminalized.
And on day one of his first term as DA Bragg had this on the mulity page list of crimes his office would not prosecute as a sop to “social justice”
Hopefully, every one of these businesses and buildings reports the defacing of their property, giving the police a large number of instances for which to locate nearby surveillance footage. While the best thing from an aesthetic and “quality of life” standpoint is to remove the (truly uninspired) tag immediately, there is also the hope that, if apprehended, Mr. Smoke (or Ms. Smoke #feminism) would be forced to remove their graffiti themselves to understand that however easy it was to write, it’s 100 times more frustrating and difficult to remove.
Time to smoke “Smoke.” I am so sick of the narcissism involved in tagging one’s name on other people’s property. I don’t want to live in a slum of someone else’s ego and I hope no one else wants to, either. Taggers should be forced to remove the their vandalism and forced to clean public property on a chain gang, as far as I’m concerned.
Uptown at West 120th St the tracks of the #1,2,3 subway emerge above ground in the middle of Broadway. The beautiful stone barrier wall has been covered in graffiti for the last few months. It’s a terrible blight and it also needs to be removed.
please don’t post my name.
Yes. The MTA re did that beautiful stone entryway on W122, and now the stone is covered in graffiti. They need to clean it.
I think that this is a general quality of life issue. Another side by side example is the encampment in front of the fancy Astor on Broadway and 75-76 St. Reported and documented thru 311 yet the pile of garbage and debris builds day by day. Open Food, container boxes,, furniture etc. No one wants to take responsibility for removing it. Not my problem everyone had said to me when I report it or even go into the Astor. $4 million apartments but the garbage is not my. Problem. Help!
Defend the graffiti, prosecute the guy with the 99-cent disco ball x-mas ornament. Yep, this is the Upper West Side.
SMOKE – Socialist Movement one Kamerad Elected
That interpretation would at least be consistent with our consensus diagnosis of the perpetrator as a dullard.
Graffiti Free NYC was cut under Blas. A very scaled-back version returned. Maybe Mamdani will put some more money into the program. Then again, his advocacy for homeless encampments and shanty towns tells me he’s not that interested in quality-of-life laws.
One thing that’s almost certain, this was likely done by one or multiple males. Every morning, midday and evening news features these nuisance and more serious crimes that are almost all committed by boys or men. Let’s finally address and analyze what’s going wrong with male behavior that’ ends up costing countless tax dollars and horrendous damage to innocent people and businesses.
This is exactly why we need more cameras and more cops on the streets, as well as we need to prosecute these smaller quality of life crimes. There is no reason why thirty buildings and businesses need to hire repairmen and painters, and cleaners for this one thug.
Could it be something sinister to follow? Like, “Where there’s Smoke, there’s fire”?
Better than NYCGAS which has been tagged all over the west 50s on 9th and 10th for more than 10 years.
Defacing property is a crime, it should not be taken lightly, even once, you do the crime, you do the time . I do not consider this “minor”.
We want to improve our surroundings not ruin them. Fine this person hit him or her or them were it hurts each time. It will stop.
Is it a felony?
I have noticed recently that someone has been writing graffiti (white chalk) on the exteriors of the green medians at the intersection of Broadway and 86th Street. It’s very upsetting to see this and I was wondering who to contact about it. With that and all the refuse I see along Broadway in the 70s and low 80s, I feel like I’m living on the LES.
Urbanists are smoking but I doubt one of them wrote that!