STAUNTON â€â€ÂÂÂLisa Hartley thought she was doing something positive when she painted the sidewalk and street in front of her home on Peyton Street last week. She didn't know her actions would have her arrested, charged with a felony and in jail by Friday afternoon.
Hartley started painting the sidewalk in front of her home because the damage had gotten out of control, she said, causing the area to look bad.
"This is ridiculous to have infrastructure like this," Hartley said as she pointed to the sidewalk where pieces of it are broken, cracked or missing.
"They've done no maintenance," she said of the city. "It was hazardous for us to get to our vehicles," Hartley said.
So she took it upon herself to replace some of the sidewalk in front of their home, adding concrete where chunks of the sidewalk was missing. Last week, she painted the sidewalk with concrete stain and sealer and marked the street with a traffic line and crosswalk so people would stop cutting the corner, Hartley said.
Hartley said she's become jaded with calling city public works.
"We've called on numerous occasions about a lot of things around here," to no avail, she said. The most recent calls were about the damage done to the street from constant water main line repairs.
"You get to a point where you say 'Why bother?'" Hartley said.
Staunton Public Works Director Tom Sliwoski said he has no record of any calls from Hartley about the damaged sidewalk.
He said in certain cases, residents have talked to his department before doing anything to see if what they want to do is OK.
"In this case, there was no request made by the individual," Sliwoski said. "We can't go around letting people paint their sidewalk. It's against city code."
So when the police came to Hartley's door to arrest her Friday, she was knocked for a loop.
She was charged with a felony: intentionally destroying, defacing or damaging city property under a city code.
Hartley said she didn't intentionally do damage to anything, just make improvements.
Staunton Police Cpl. K.D. Siron said it's considered a felony because the damage estimate is greater than ,000.
Sliwoski said removing the paint would require sandblasting and the city would have to contract the job out because it isn't capable of doing it.
However, Hartley removed the paint Saturday without sandblasting.
It took her just four hours, she said.
"That's what we do for a living," Hartley said. "We're professional painters ... I don't need this grief. I tried to do something good. It's not like I'm going to write graffiti on city hall's back door."
Originally published July 6, 2005
