Graffiti Blasters

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Graffiti Blasters is a program of the city government of Chicago, Illinois to eliminate graffiti, street art and gang-related vandalism. It uses baking soda-based solvents and paints matching the city's official color scheme to erase all varieties of graffiti.

An initiative of Mayor Richard M. Daley, Graffiti Blasters costs about $6.5 million annually and promises free cleanup within 24 hours of a phone call to 3-1-1. Prior to the program's inception, the city considered itself responsible for removing graffiti if it was on city property, but private property owners had to shoulder the cleanup costs for graffiti on their own property. Perhaps as a result, Graffiti Blasters has won much praise from landowners, business owners, as well as Chicagoans in general. By contrast, it has won much disdain from taggers and other groups, and a tagging crew called "FMD (Fuck Mayor Daley) Crew" was formed in direct response.

In 1992, an ordinance was passed in Chicago that bans the sale and possession of spray paint, and certain types of etching equipment and markers.^{[citation needed]} The law falls under Chapter 8-4: Public Peace & Welfare, Section 100: Vagrancy. The specific law (8-4-130) makes graffiti an offense that surpasses public drunkenness, peddling, or disruption of a religious service punitively with a fine of no less than $500 per incident.