Vandals left a £1.1m trail of destruction at Courier Country council properties in the last two years.
Council tax payers were left with the bill for over 3,750 incidents of malicious damage and vandalism to schools, parks and leisure centres in Tayside and Fife, our investigation has revealed.
Incidents range from lead stolen from the roof of the Signal Tower Museum in Arbroath to smashed windows at Perth’s South Inch Park.
Over half of the seven-figure repair bill was in Fife, where there was a total of 2,041 incidents at a cost of £635,345.
These included a £38,410 bill to board up windows and a door and remove external access stairs at Q11 in Glenrothes’s Flemington Road, the former postal address of the council’s graffiti removal team, and £22,000 to repair the roof at Benarty Primary School in Lochore.
Council chiefs believe beefed-up security measures, including CCTV, have helped reduce the bill from £326,921 to £308,424 in the last financial year, with the number of incidents dropping from 1038 to 1003.
Fife Council’s head of asset and facilities management Ken Gourlay said: “We spent approximately £300,000 dealing with issues of vandalism and removal of graffiti last year.
“We take these issues very seriously as they can cause real disruption in our communities.
“Over the past few years we have improved security measures at a number of our buildings with more CCTV cameras being installed and other systems being improved.
“Whilst we recognise that these costs are still significant, they have been reducing over recent years and we will continue to work with local police to try and prevent incidents where possible.”
Incidents of malicious damage to Perth and Kinross Council properties dropped from 123 to 92, leaving the authority with a bill of £20,531 this year, compared to £25,881 in 2013/14.
The largest repair bills were £2,938 to replace roof slates and felt at the empty Hill Primary in Blairgowrie and £3,110 to repair a skylight at Kinloch Rannoch Primary School.
A Perth and Kinross Council spokeswoman said: “Any vandalism to council properties is always of concern to us, however the drop in incidents between 2013 and 2014 is to be welcomed and we would look for this trend to continue.
“The work we have undertaken in recent years to enhance and upgrade public facilities like schools, community provision and parks we hope is helping to foster additional pride in our communities.
“The council, as well as responding as quickly as possible to reports of vandalism on its properties, is vigilant in making regular checks to buildings and facilities.
“We would ask anyone who witnesses vandalism to contact us and the police to report any incidents.”
Dundee recorded a dramatic drop in the number of incidents, 790 to 511, leaving the council with a £160,211 repair bill compared to £238,549 the previous year.
Council leader Ken Guild said: “While we welcome the decrease in vandalism across the city, we cannot become complacent. The council works hard to apply risk management measures to reduce the impact and cost of vandalism.
“We work to encourage people to look after the place they live. This is why we launched our Take Pride in Your City campaign earlier this year.”
The only local authority to record an increase in expenditure on repairs was Angus, although the total number of incidents dropped from 106 to 93.