Vandals dirty up our loos

FOR the Clarence Valley Council's parks cleaner, yesterday started like far too many others – cleaning a toilet block targeted overnight by vandals.

FOR the Clarence Valley Council's parks cleaner, yesterday started like far too many others - cleaning a toilet block targeted overnight by vandals.

This time it was Alex Bell Park (pirate park) in South Grafton where vandals got industrious on Wednesday night and filled the toilet bowls and hand basins with mulch from the gardens outside, ripped off the toilet seats and threw them on the road and broke part of the nearby play equipment.

At least this time he wasn't confronted with one of the regular tricks - faeces in the hand basin.

The council's manager of environment and open spaces, Peter Birch, said that last financial year the council spent more than $131,000 cleaning up after vandals and this financial year had already spent more than $53,000.

Those most frequently targeted were toilet blocks in Grafton's Market Square and Beresford Park in South Grafton.

The council closes toilet blocks in Yamba because of ongoing vandalism attacks.

He said four offenders had been caught in the past 12 months and they had been forced to undertake counselling and help clean up.

Mr Birch said he could not understand the attraction vandals had for damaging toilet blocks.

The council offers up to a $2000 reward for information leading to the conviction of vandals and asked neighbours to be vigilant.

Originally published as Vandals dirty up our loos