Bad graffiti. This is an example of graffiti at the Indian Foothills Park skate park that isn't offensive enough to be immediately erased but doesn't qualify as interesting or acceptable, either, according to park officials. [Click to enlarge]

Given the expanse of smooth concrete that makes up the skateboard park at Indian Foothills Park in Marshall, graffiti may be inevitable.

Parks and Recreation Director Jeff Stubblefield has expressed an interest in an "if you can't beat them, join them" approach to the graffiti problem.

He informed the parks board Wednesday, July 5, that he has started talking with Pat O'Hanlon of Pahlo Art Refinery about the possibility of intentionally covering the walls of the skateboard park in graffiti.

Good graffiti. This sketch on the west wall of the Indian Foothills Park skate park is cited by Parks and Recreation Director Jeff Stubblefield as the kind of public art he would like to encourage. [Click to enlarge]

Good graffiti.

"You can't stop it," Stubblefield said. "I want to put something on there that the kids can relate to. I'd kind of like to have some skating motifs."

Graffiti has appeared on the walls of the skateboard park periodically. Stubblefield said park workers immediately remove anything that is clearly offensive.

Some of the drawings on the walls are just junk, according to Stubblefield, but some are interesting and show the artist had skill.

"There're good ones down there," he said. "One is a pretty cool piece of artwork. I don't mind that."

By enlisting the help of O'Hanlon and others in the art community to provide good graffiti, Stubblefield hopes to leave less room for the junk.

"He's going to take a look at it and bring some ideas," he said.

In other skateboard park news, Stubblefield informed the board that he would be seeking a second extension from the Missouri Department of Natural Resources for completing the skateboard park project.

The project received a $63,000 Land and Water Conservation Fund grant in June 2003 and was supposed to be completed within a year.

However, a number of complications have delayed the project well past its initial schedule. Periodic rains have slowed the final stages of the project recently.

"We needed that two-and-a-half inches (of rain)," Stubblefield said of the storm that moved through the area early Tuesday. "But we didn't need it down there. We'll be pumping water out for a few more days."

He estimated that six more pours of concrete will finish the skating surface. What will remain is the addition of things like signs, trash receptacles, benches and possibly a shelter house and rest room in the future.

The Parks and Recreation Department received a tourism grant in April to help with some of those finishing touches. Stubblefield said signs paid for by that grant have been ordered.

Stubblefield's personal goal was to complete the skateboard park before his second anniversary as director. That date is July 26.

"It's going to get close," he said. "But I think we're going to get there."

Contact Eric Crump at

marshallfaith@socket.net