Taggers well in the frame

Kaitaia Primary School buildings were tagged earlier this week, for the fifth time since the school holidays began.

The incident provided mixed emotions for principal Brendon Morrisey though.

On the one hand he was furious; on the other he was delighted that the security cameras had caught the culprits, a boy and a girl, red-handed.

"The main tags seem to be NIKO, NASKO (the girl did that one), Dasuk and Monster One," Mr Morrisey said.

"These tags can be seen all over town. I'm sure these two in our photos aren't the only ones doing it, but they've been caught red-handed this time.

"We've been hit five times since the start of the school holidays," he added.

"It seems like it's just kids with nothing else to do, and no adult supervision is happening. I can't be the only resident in Kaitaia upset by the time we have to spend getting rid of this mess. As soon as the police have names for these two trespass orders will be issued to them."

The school loved to share its grounds with the community, but doing damage was unacceptable.

"Our aim is to be a school for the community and to share our resources when we can," he said.

"We love the fact that families bring their kids here to play, people come here and do their fitness workouts too - we've got lots of stairs. We don't even mind older kids coming just to hang out.

"What we don't want or need are those who come here and do damage to our lovely school environment. We've worked so hard over the years to make our Decile 1 school the wonderful place it is for everyone in our community."

In the meantime he was contemplating spreading pictures of the taggers around Kaitaia, so their families, grandparents included, could 'enjoy' seeing them.

Meanwhile, a tagger has also defaced the front wall of Kaitaia's Te Ahu cinema. The Northland Age is keen to hear from anyone who can identify it.