I feel like this is just another example of the lag in society to accept skateboarders. Every town has basketball, volleyball and tennis courts of all kinds readily accessible, lights included, despite them remaining empty 90% of the time. However we have to fight for even the most basic skateboarding facility even when the city outlaws the activity on their own sidewalks.
Graffiti is rampant all over Los Angeles. Do they honestly think that just because it's at a skatepark, we are all spraying on the ramps instead of skating? How about you dump sand on all the businesses in LA and see if that fixes the graffiti problem. Same goes with garbage. These are kids. Teach them not to litter. This sand thing would never happen at a basketball court. These facilities are heavily used (which is a good thing). Skateboarders are not dispropotionately worse at picking up their trash, it's just that the park gets used by hundreds of people every day, all day, as opposed to your average basketball court's 10 people for the day. If kids were always hanging out at the other recreational areas there would be just as much graffiti and trash if not more. Would they dump sand in the basketball court too? Or threaten to bulldoze it? Probably not. Skateboarders are judged way more harshly than anyone else.
Bullshit.