07-09 Sept 07, New York City (USA)

The City of New York is the most populous city in the US, one of the preeminent global economic centers having worldwide influence, but most important: The Graffiti-Mekka.

The city comprises five boroughs, each of which is coterminous with a county: The Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island. With over 8.2 million residents within an area of 322 square miles (830 km²), New York City is the most densely populated major city in North America. The metropolitan area has a population of nearly 22 million and ranks among the largest urban areas in the world.

The New York City Subway is notable for being among the few rapid transit systems in the world to run 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

	Among the ten busiest systems in the world in terms of annual passenger traffic, it is the only one to hold such a distinction, setting it apart from cities such as London, Paris, Tokyo, and Moscow.

In all those years of the NYC-MOS it has never been easy to get it going (years ago the former MOS-organiser Cern got arrested cause of the MOS). As the city has been tagged and bombed hard for decades, a climate of „zero tolerance” and „broken windows” is still around the city. As Graffiti is a sign of rebellion for authorities, the city still tries to vanish Graffiti in all its forms.„Broken Windows”

George L. Kelling, was hired as a consultant to the New York City Transit Authority in 1985, and robust measures to test the Broken Windows theory were implemented by David Gunn

Graffiti vandalism was intensively targeted, and the system was cleaned line by line and car by car from 1984 until 1990. In 1990 William J. Bratton became head of the Transit Police.
	Bratton described George L. Kelling as his “intellectual mentor”, and implemented zero tolerance of fare-dodging, easier arrestee processing methods and background checks on all those arrested.
Republican Mayor Rudy Giuliani also adopted the strategy more widely in New York City, from his election in 1993, under the rubrics of ‘zero tolerance’ and ‘quality of life’.
	Thus, Giuliani’s “zero tolerance” roll out was part of an interlocking set of wider reforms, crucial parts of which had been underway since 1985.

Giuliani had the police even more strictly enforce the law against subway fare evasion, stopped public drinkers, urinators, and the “squeegee men” who had been wiping windshields of stopped cars and demanding payment. Critics point to the fact that rates of major crimes also dropped in many other US cities during the 1990s…

Now you know you that NY is tuff place for Graffiti, pretty well illustrated by the mad propaganda NY-authorities run against Ket. The city has been bombed hard since years, so no question about the fact that the city of New York is strict Anti-Graffiti since years and that it aint easy to do a Jam in the Big Apple. But eventhough our Locals managed it several times.

The NYC Meeting of Styles happened again in 007, showcasing some of the best talent in NYC. Due to certain situations that have been brought to life in the past couple of weeks before the event, it was scheduled to be a bit smaller and the locations to be given a few days prior. The line was full and unfortunately there was no additional space for anyone who just showed up.

	Any painter who has not been in contact with the locals, was not able to paint. We tried to accomodate as many writers as possible every year, but some complications this year we just had to take in stride,
Also we hope that all understand. We look forward to all who come out and attend, and next years event is already being prepared to being bigger and better.COL. Robotswillkill

After Coped arranged the permit of the landlord, Col put it on. Some writers showed up on friday to prepare the walls, most met saturday morning. Major NY-Crews such as the Wallnuts, TD4, FX and Graff writers from around the world…

… Canada, Europe, Puerto Rico, united in the Bronx in an effort to attest graffiti as an art-form and not vandalism. As Cope was buisy during the weekend, he had done his piece a day before. 156 from Montreal came along,
	Old-School was down to rock some walls. A lot of People came along to chill and to enjoy Graffiti in a peacefull and relaxed vibe up in the Bronx.

	… both those that had adopted ‘zero tolerance’ policies and those that had not. Other research has pointed out that the ‘zero tolerance’ effect on serious crime is difficult to disentangle from other Initiatives happening at around the same time in New York.
Initiatives such as the police reforms described above, programs that moved over 500,000 people into jobs from welfare and housing vouchers that enabled poor families to move to better neighborhoods.
	Alternative explanations that have been put forward include: The subsidence in the crack epidemic, unrelated growth in the prison population due to Rockefeller drug laws,
that the number of males aged 16-24 was dropping anyway due to demographic changes, that more people were getting jobs and thus finding a way out of crime.
	Alain Ket Maridueña is a publisher, writer, Hip Hop historian, activist and graffiti artist from New York City. He was charged in New York City courts (Brooklyn, Queens, and Manhattan) on counts of felony criminal mischief… read more.