Image: Mike Vanden Bosch / PML / A realtor's ad on a bench across from Fire Hall No. 4 on South Sumas Road has been defaced for over a month, and the company responsible for maintaining them, Creative Outdoor, has been slow to address the graffiti.

By Mike Vanden Bosch

Bus stop graffiti

Ad company slow to address graffiti at Chilliwack bus stops

Jan 11, 2023 | 6:29 AM

CHILLIWACK — For whatever reason, graffiti vandals seem to spread their visual blight at bench bus stops in various parts of Chilliwack.

And the Fraser Valley company responsible for installing and maintaining the bus ads has been allowing these incidents of graffiti to linger, taking sometimes over a month to repair them.

On December 7, a Fraser Valley Today reporter casually contacted Key Bench, a Fraser Valley company also known as Creative Outdoor, to alert them to graffiti on benches at B.C. Transit stops in Chilliwack, including one ad on a bench directly across from Fire Hall No. 4 at 45433 South Sumas Road. That ad featured a realtor whose eyes had been scratched out completely.

After a second email reporting the same incident of graffiti, a Creative Outdoor representative said on December 14 that it was aware of the graffiti and would address it on its next scheduled service visit.

More than a month later after the first email on December 7, Creative Outdoor still had not removed the graffiti.

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Graffiti on another realtor’s ad outside Save-on-Foods on Yale Road had been reported likewise by a Fraser Valley Today reporter. Initially reported on December 7, the graffiti was still up as of Monday, January 9, over a month later.

Image: Mike Vanden Bosch / PML / Graffiti on a realtor’s ad outside Save-on-Foods on Yale Road in downtown Chilliwack.

One defaced ad the company managed to repair in late November, or early December, was located directly in front of the fire hall on South Sumas Road, but that was after an emailed picture and a phone call were placed with Creative Outdoor from a Fraser Valley Today reporter.

When graffiti appears on signs belonging to the City of Chilliwack, Chilliwack residents can send an email to operations@chilliwack.com, or call 604-793-2810, and public works crews tend to be swift in responding to them.

The email to report graffiti at Chilliwack bus stops involving Key Bench is production@creativeoutdoor.com.

by Mike Vanden Bosch

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Ad company slow to address graffiti at Chilliwack bus stops

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