Seven-year-old calls on council to clean up offensive graffiti at Laytown playground
Leah Doherty
A SEVEN-YEAR-OLD Mornington girl has received a great response after she made a video plea to ask teenagers to stop ruining her local playground with offensive graffiti and for the council to take action.
In the 90-second video sent to Meath Co Council, little Freya Doolan urged her local authority to take action and to clean up the inappropriate drawings on the boat play area in Laytown playground.
"Meath Co Council, I want to tell you something about the playground. There have been drawings here for a long time. It is not fair for kids here.
"These drawings are inappropriate for kids. Teenagers come here but sometimes they've been drawing.
"I love Laytown's playground but this is inappropriate. I am just seven. My dad has asked before, so please listen to me.
"Meath Co Council, please clean the Laytown playground."
In response to the video made by Freya with the help of her father, Oliver Doolan, Meath County Council said: "Unfortunately, graffiti is an ongoing issue generally in playgrounds and is normally removed as part of normal cleaning, however if anything has been missed we will undertake to remove it.
"A programme of additional cleaning of playgrounds is due to commence in Duleek during July, the playgrounds in Laytown and Bettystown will be added to these works."
More action needs to be taken to stop the graffiti happening in Laytown playground says Oliver. “I think it’s great that they are removing it but we need more signage even to try and encourage young people not to do it. Or even a QR code for parents and guardians to report stuff quickly. If they are actually really interested in keeping it clean, there should be other ways to communicate that to people.”
After spending nearly every day at Laytown playground, Freya had stopped going because of the graffiti. “We go regularly, everytime after school she wanted to go down. Because of all of the offensive graffiti, we stopped going.
“Even for parents and guardians it could be potentially upsetting. For it to be sitting there is just completely wrong”, says Oliver.
Graffiti in Laytown playground is not as persistent as the local council claim it to be says Oliver who has been going to the playground for years with Freya. “I don’t think that the graffiti is as reoccurring as they are suggesting it is because it is the same graffiti from years ago there was no new additional graffiti in these areas.
“I photographed graffiti on the playground and when I went back nine months later it was the same stuff, there was no additional graffiti. I think it’s just easy to say it’s a regular occurrence.
“My issue with the Laytown playground is that they just don’t clean it. That graffiti has been sitting there for months and potentially years.
“The Meath Co Council need to do what they say. It’s about having someone that will care and look after it. There should be no tolerance for it.”