City of San Jose Anti-Graffiti Program

They have recently added a new contractor (Graffiti Protective Coatings) and they turn around reports in their juridstiction in 24 – 72 hours. Report the graffiti with the «San Jose Clean» app on iOS and Android for fastest response. They offer training and cleaning material, so you can clean small tags yourself.
They can’t get the ones on private property, VTA, water district or highways but they forward the reports to those agencies.
Remember if you see tagging in progress, call 911.
You can call in reports to 866−249−0543 as well, but it is a bit frustrating since that is a contractor in Nevada that doesn’t know the San Jose area very well so you have to spell a lot of street names and explain the locations. The smartphone app is the way to go.

I have been getting supplies from the City of San Jose’s Anti Graffiti program for years. They’re always helpful but calling in tags was tedious. Sometimes I’d get four or five call backs on the same report, and it was clear they needed some improvement on their processes.
Now they have a cell phone app called San Jose Clean, and it’s a free app in the Android Market,(there’s an iPhone version of it too). It helps so much when reporting because you send a photo of the graffiti instead of describing it verbally, and it lists the GPS of the photo which all goes directly to a contractor they’ve hired to clean graffiti. Sweet.
Now I report more graffiti than ever and it’s getting cleaned faster too.

San Jose’s anti-​graffiti program in ineffective and underfunded. The management of the anti-​graffiti program don’t sweat the details.

The City of San Jose’s, Anti Graffiti program is a great use of tax-​payer dollars. I know this program very well as they have done their best to keep our streets graffiti free by: suppliying neighborhood associations with Anti Graffiti Kits, responding to resident complaints about graffiti on buildings/​side-​walks/​bus stops/​etc., using proactive tactics by labeling certain areas «graffiti hotspots,» and consistently partnering with neighborhood groups during service events… commonly called «graffiti wipe-​outs.» Not only does Anti Graffiti have a great mission statement – they also have a very friendly, hard-​working staff that really cares about what they do… as opposed to some of our city-​workers in other departments (I won’t say any names… hmm hmm Department of Transportation). So, if you notice an increase of graffiti in your neighborhood, call on Anti Graffiti for support – not only will they help you wipe out some of the graffiti, they will provide you with supplies, so together with your community, you can be proavtice and keep it clean. Remember, with budget cuts and massive city lay-​offs, we all need to be a bit more proactive during this financial SNAFU.

This program is great! They made that random commercial with Littering Lucy and All-​Star Stan, and they’re very proud of it :) We contacted them for our middle-​school service day, and they helped us by providing us with the chemicals and sponges to clean up graffiti on our own. They were very helpful. They also do a great job at cleaning up graffiti; within a day of reporting an incident, the graffiti will be gone. They’re great!

I got a bit pissed at seeing more and more graffiti on the stairs and benches where I walk my dog, and others walk for excercise. I took my own can of acetone to clean up a pretty big job on the benches, and asked my home owners association for a reimbursement of some sort for the materials. I was turned on to this service provided by the city. I got a pretty good kit with gloves, solvent, sponge, mask, glasses and some rags the first time. When the solvent wasn’t enough for last night’s event, they gave me a brush and a choice of paint to cover up everything.
I realize this isn’t very subjective, but I didn’t know about it, and hope it helps others who want to help keep your areas clean.