Newcastle Knights stars and coach Adam O'Brien join community street clean-up on way to training day before Monday's trial against Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs

As the Newcastle Herald reported yesterday, Mr McCloy took matters into his own hands to organise a two-day cleanup of CBD graffiti after what he said was months of urging City of Newcastle chief executive Jeremy Bath to "do something".

Coach O'Brien said the Knights players "jumped at the chance" to take part today, and there was certainly plenty of good-humoured banter as the team hooked into the various jobs assigned to them.

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They started at the former Newcastle post office in Newcastle East before moving to the vacant block opposite Kentucky Fried Chicken on the corner of Hunter Street and Steel Street.

After repainting a wooden fence on Steel Street behind the Family Hotel, they headed off to train for Monday, the first trial match of the season.

"We put a message out to the players and straight away the responses came pinging back, 'I'm in, I'm in, I'm in!'," Mr O'Brien said.

He said almost two dozen players were taking part today with about 15 - including some doubling up - on Sunday.

He said the Knights were regularly approached to help with community efforts and pitched in when they can, although it was obviously easier in off-season than during competition.

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Opening round this year kicks off on Thursday, March 10, with the Knights playing the Sydney Roosters in Sydney on the Saturday at 3pm.

"Hopefully the kids that are doing the graffiti will see this, and see the Knights players they admire doing the cleanup, and they'll think 'I didn't want to make the players do that'," Mr O'Brien said.

McGloy group employees were on hand this morning to supervise and to ferry supplies to the various work sites across the CBD.

Mr McCloy said professional crews were doing the jobs that took specialist skills, including the removal of graffiti from glass windows and doors, which had begun in darkness at 4am today.

Mr McCloy only informed Mr Bath of the weekend's effort on Friday, and the council chief executive was not entirely happy when he contacted the Herald in reaction to the our initial report of today's events.

Mr Bath said the council already had a graffiti control response; a joint initiative with Juvenile Justice NSW using supervised young offenders to clean sites.

He acknowledged that the state's Graffiti Control Act allowed councils to clean private property without the owners' permission but said the council had to pay the costs, meaning that ratepayers subsidised private property owners.

Mr McCloy said that might the case, but said any money spent by the council in maintaining the appearance of the CBD was likely to be recouped if it helped attract people back in to the CBD, both through extra parking meter revenue and increased rates if property values rose on the back of a more attractive city.

Former Newcastle councillor Bob Cook (2008 to 2012) said today in response to the cleanup drive that former general manager Lindy Hyam (September 2008 to November 2010) had introduced a dedicated graffiti team during her time in Newcastle.

Mr Cook said the unit was extremely popular with the public and helped strengthen the council's reputation.

Contacted by the Herald, Ms Hyam said she did not want to comment on the present situation but confirmed what she described as a three-person "rapid response team" based at the council's works depot at Waratah.

"It was in response to community concern over the amount of graffiti in the city," Ms Hyam said today.

"We would try to remove graffiti as soon as it was posted, because we found the quicker it was removed, the more of a deterrent that was.

"We recognised that street art was different to graffiti, and so part of it was to invite people to do their own artwork in some areas, and some of it was beautifully done. It was about encouraging the right kind of artwork rather than vandalising property."

The privately funded welfare organisation Soul Cafe had a crew out working today, including chief executive Rick Prosser and his wife Sue, who both endorsed the value of what was being done.

Thornton business Stan Paints had eight people taking part including boss Stan Masima and relatives employed in the family owned firm.

"We're all volunteering," Mr Masima said.

Mr McCloy thanked those who were taking part, and said there was "nothing political" about what they were doing, it was simply about pride in the appearance of the city.

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