Michael Bushnell
Northeast News
March 2, 2016

KANSAS CITY, Missouri — If you’ve driven along any of Historic Northeast’s main traffic arteries lately, you may have noticed a drastic uptick in graffiti tags by two area underground artists.

“Roast” and “Screw” are two underground taggers who have, since last October, spray painted their monikers on any blank sign, wall or wood frame façade that can be seen from the public right of way. Drive around the Northeast and you’ll see these tags on buildings — both abandoned and occupied — pools, street signs, post office boxes and even vehicles.

Most recently, “Screw” spent an extended period of time in the basin of the Budd Park pool causing thousands of dollars in damage and creating a big headache for the city’s Parks and Recreation Department in getting the offending tag removed without harming the delicate pool wall in the process.

“We need to be very careful as we make sure we use the right material to remove and repaint so as not to damage the pool paint,”  Terry Rynard, deputy director with Parks and Recreation, said.

Bobbi Baker-Hughes, Chair of the Independence Avenue CID and Northeast Kansas City Chamber of Commerce, is not pleased with the proliferation of the work of “Screw” and “Roast”.

“We’ve reached out through some alternate channels to try and bring this “Roast” person to the table without any negative repercussion but he seems pretty hell bent on continuing his defacing and vandalism of our community,” Baker-Hughes said. “Our desire was to include him in discussions and possibly use his talent for good instead of bad. Apparently he has no interest in being a positive influence on young artists so he kind of leaves us no choice but to pursue this through the channels of the court system.”

Bryan Stalder, President of the Indian Mound Neighborhood Association, is also frustrated with the recent proliferation of new tags.

“It’s extremely frustrating because ever since last October, these two guys have really ramped up their activity in our area and we still don’t have any kind of positive ID on who they might be,” Stalder said. “We’re waiting for the Budd Park camera footage to be reviewed to see if it shows anything, but yes, it’s extremely frustrating right now.”

Parks Department Director Mark McHenry pledged his department would do everything in their power to assist in the identification of the vandals. The Northeast News will follow this story and provide more information once it becomes available.