Santa Cruz man produces pro-police graphic

The owner of a Santa Cruz art shop is responding to an anti-police stencil with some artwork of his own.

A stenciled image reading “kill cops, not trees” was found spray painted on a sidewalk earlier this week. The new image reads “love cops and trees” and is available as a downloadable image that can be printed and displayed.

A confused and violent message – kill cops not trees.

“How could it be anything else but deplorable,” said Santa Cruz resident Sherry Halperin.

The graffiti was found Monday by someone walking across a bridge over the San Lorenzo River near the Ross store.

The message has since been cleaned up but it’s still something that Halperin says is disgraceful.

“Our policemen here in Santa Cruz are understaffed overworked and do an incredible job for what they are given,” said Halperin.

Halperin isn’t the only one with this feeling.

“I think my reaction to the message was pretty much what would most normal people would be and that was appalled,” said Andrew Lenz, manager of Lenz Arts in Santa Cruz.

Lenz says he saw the graffiti and decided he was going to alter the message.

“I just changed it to love cops and trees,” said Lenz.

Instead of spray painting “love cops and trees” on a bridge Lenz decided he was hang it proudly from his storefront window and share it on social media for others to see and download.

“The message was definitely violent and I wanted to take something that was bad and turn into something good,” said Lenz.

The spray painted graffiti comes after a violent few weeks involving police officers in Dallas, Baton Rouge and Minnesota. The list seems endless for residents like Matt Hill.

“I’ve never seen it this extreme before with all the killings and stuff,” said Hill.

Hill, however, says he is optimistic that change will come.

“We will get through this trough that we are in and come out on the wave,” said Hill.

And maybe Lenz’ message will help inspire the change.

“It didn’t take very long it was only a few minutes but the message is definitely more positive,” said Lenz.

Though a small gesture it had a big impact.

“This is wonderful, this is a gem, this is what it is all about,” said Halperin “Love police, love trees, love everyone, come on we are in Santa Cruz.”