A Dundee business owner says the city centre is facing a “huge problem” with crime after his fancy dress shop was left covered with graffiti.
David Farry arrived at Yvonne’s Fancy Dress on Seagate on Monday morning to find the windows of the shop had been covered with blue spray paint.
It came just weeks after windows at the store were smashed.
At least one other shop, Robertsn & Watt jewellers on High Street, also appeared to have been sprayed with graffiti on Monday.
David says retailers in the city centre are constantly battling anti-social behaviour and crime – forcing some to consider their futures.
Yvonne’s Fancy Dress covered with graffiti after windows smashed
He said: “It’s enough to make you think, ‘What am I doing here?’
“That’s the stage we’re at.
“We just had our windows smashed a few weeks ago – that cost us around £1,000 to fix.
“Now the main shop front on Seagate has been covered in blue spray paint and it’s taken us about an hour to clean the majority of it off this morning.
“The city centre is facing a huge problem at the moment. This isn’t an isolated incident at our shop.”
David continued: “Walking between here and our Wellgate store I’m seeing smashed advertising hoardings, graffiti everywhere and open drug dealing.
“It’s demoralising to see what is going on in our city centre.
“If visitors come in via the bus station they are having an entirely different experience to those coming off the train.
“If I was a visitor coming out of the bus station, I wouldn’t feel safe walking this way to the city centre.
“As a business, we’re also facing a lot of issues with shoplifting and I’m aware M&S on the Murraygate was facing similar problems.
“It sounds ridiculous but just having two police officers patrolling back and forth between the Overgate and Wellgate would make all the difference.
“On Peter Street, there also used to be a CCTV camera which has been taken down.
“We’ve tried to combat the vandalism by putting murals on the walls and that has worked to an extent.”
David says he is reporting the incident to Police Scotland.
The Courier has examined matters affecting the city centre through our Dundee Matters project, which included a high street summit.
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