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At 82 years old, Edward Kalil tries his best to keep his property at the corner of Sherbrooke St. and Westmore Ave. in Notre-Dame-de-Grâce clean of graffiti, but the vandals are relentless.

“You take it off and it goes back on and this goes on and on and on,” said Kalil, whose building is occupied by a Second Cup.

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He was fined $700 under a borough by-law that targets building owners for failing to keep their property free of illegal graffiti. After so much effort to combat the graffiti, Kalil said, “I plead not guilty.”

The by-law, which went into effect on Oct. 19, 2011, stipulates that owners of residential buildings with six or more dwellings, or commercial buildings larger than 300 square meters, must remove illegal graffiti or risk being fined. Private citizens can be fined $100 for their first offence and a company can be fined as much as $4,000 for repeat offences.

Kalil was fined about a year ago, he said, and his court date is set for April 28 at 9:30 am. It comes with $300 in court fees, he noted.