LOS ANGELES — Frustrated by the city's slow progress in painting crosswalks at intersections they believe are unsafe, activists in Los Angeles have been picking up paint rollers and doing it themselves. Now one of them has been arrested on a vandalism charge.
In a video posted online, Jonathan Hale wears a bright yellow safety vest as he's handcuffed by a police officer Sunday. His group, People's Vision Zero, had organized a guerrilla ''paint party'' at a four-way crossing in a leafy residential neighborhood of west LA.
''You're vandalizing city property without a permit," the officer says.
A woman out of frame can be heard saying, ''Leave him alone. He's not doing anything wrong."
Hale and his allies have organized stealth painting operations across the city at intersections they deem dangerous to pedestrians. They set up barricades and yellow tape and swiftly use rollers to paint the street with bright white markers that they say are code compliant. The group is expanding on work done for years by a similar advocacy organization, the Crosswalk Collective.
''Now, the city will have to spend taxpayer dollars removing our half-finished crosswalk when this whole situation could have been avoided if the mayor's office didn't choose to ignore an issue where people's lives are at stake,'' Hale said in a statement following his arrest.
He said he's been in touch with the office of Mayor Karen Bass and the city's Department of Transportation, or LADOT, but there has been little response.
''Since then I've made it clear to them that we won't stop unless they publicly condemn us, or take tangible steps to make our streets safer,'' Hale said.
