By Shavonne Potts
Salisbury Post
Since vandals targeted the Fulton Heights neighborhood this week with spray paint scribbled on multiple cars, neighbors have banded together to remove the graffiti.
The incident occurred sometime Thursday night on Maupin and Mitchell avenues.
One of the cars, a red mini Cooper, was parked at Michael Young’s Maupin Avenue home and spray-painted from the front to the back on the driver’s side.
However, two other cars, a Volkswagen and his neighbor’s pickup, which were parked behind his, weren’t touched.
Young said it seemed that the targets were random.
“I think maybe someone was riding in a car and drove past to spray,” he said.
Young estimates it couldn’t have taken vandals long to spray the cars.
He offered his neighbors help with removing the paint from their cars with a product he uses at his business.
Young owns Downtown Graphics Network Inc., a company that makes custom banners, located on South Fulton Street.
The company uses a citrus-based industrial strength cleaner to remove ink from screens.
Young wasn’t sure the product would work, but he figured if it would take ink out of a screen frame then it couldn’t hurt to try it on his car.
“I tried it thinking it couldn’t do any more harm,” he said.
The product, combined with some elbow grease, got all of the paint off the vehicle.
“You can’t tell it was hit,” he said.
When Young’s vehicle came clean, he put out an e-mail message to subscribed neighbors letting them know he had a product to clean their vehicles.
At least three cars that Young knows of have been cleaned using the citrus product.
Young said if people would bring some type of rag or cloth to clean the cars, they can use the cleanser.
“This is a pretty tight-knit community. When anything like this happens we share information,” he said.
Although residents are aware of the vandalism, Young said he doesn’t think this has made them fearful.
“It’s a pretty safe neighborhood,” he said.
Contact Shavonne Potts at 704-797-4253 or spotts@salisburypost.com.