Sign Codes

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A sign welcomes visitors to Bentley Manor in Shavano Park. Source: mytexashomeresource.com

It is a rare free speech case where a court finds a regulation content based, but still upholds the regulation.  That very scenario played out in a federal district court in Texas, when it upheld the City of Shavano Park’s sign regulation prohibiting certain banner signs.

Shavano Park, a suburb of San Antonio, has a sign code that controls the placement of signs on private property.  The code allows one temporary sign per residential lot, with some additional allowances when properties are for sale or during election seasons.  The code also allows the placement of banner signs in residential zoning districts, with some limitations.  These limitations include that such signs may be erected by a homeowners’ association, they may be placed at entrances to residential neighborhoods, no more than one banner sign is allowed per owner, and banner signs are only permitted in the week before the first Tuesday in October, which coincides with National Night Out.  The sign code’s stated rationale for its restrictions focuses largely on aesthetics.
Continue Reading Texas City’s Banner Sign Limitation Found Content Based, But Survives First Amendment Challenge

A Broke Ass Phone location in Strongsville, Ohio. Source: Broke Ass Phone.

In a somewhat entertaining case out of Boardman Township, Ohio, the state court of appeals has ruled that a business called “Broke Ass Phone” may display its sign under the Boardman Township zoning ordinance, which otherwise prohibits obscene or offensive signs.

Broke Ass Phone is a company that specializes in repairing broken smartphones and other devices.  In 2015, the company applied for a sign permit in Boardman to allow the company to post its business sign.  The township zoning inspector denied the permit application, finding that it violated the township code provision prohibiting obscene signs.  The applicant then appealed the decision to the township’s Board of Zoning Appeals.  In 2017, the board denied the appeal.  The company then appealed the denial to the local common pleas court, asserting First Amendment arguments.  The common pleas court affirmed the decision of the zoning appeals board, and the company appealed to the state appeals court.
Continue Reading Ohio Appeals Court Finds That “Broke Ass Phone” Is Not Obscene, May Be Displayed On A Business Sign

A billboard in Texas. Source: Austin American-Statesman.

A federal district court in Texas recently found that the City of Cedar Park’s sign code was content based and unconstitutional due to its failure to distinguish between commercial and noncommercial billboards.

A billboard company sought permits to convert existing billboards to digital signs, as well as to erect new signs.  The city denied the permit applications for failure to comply with the city’s sign code, and the billboard company sued.  In its lawsuit, the billboard company argued that the city’s decision to distinguish between on- and off-premises signs was content based, because it applied to noncommercial signs in the same manner as commercial signs.  Generally speaking, the government may not distinguish between the content or message of various noncommercial signs.  Per the billboard company, a code enforcement officer would be required to determine the permissibility of the sign based on its content, in violation of the First Amendment.  The federal district court agreed and granted summary judgment in favor of the plaintiff.  About a month ago, the court denied the city’s motion for reconsideration.
Continue Reading Texas City’s Sign Code Found Content Based, Unconstitutional

This past summer, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals found that a billboard company’s challenge to a billboard restriction in Bellwood, Illinois was mooted by the fact that the company lost its lease on the property that it intended to construct a billboard.  The court affirmed dismissal of the company’s First Amendment, equal protection, and antitrust claims.

In 2005, Paramount Media obtained leasehold rights to a property in the village abutting I-290, a high-traffic interstate corridor outside of Chicago.  Although it sought the necessary state permits for a billboard, it failed to seek permits from the village.  In 2009, the village amended its sign code to prohibit new billboards.  The village later amended the code again to allow billboards on village-owned property.  Paramount then sought to lease village-owned property along the interstate, but was rebuked, as the village had leased its property to another billboard company.
Continue Reading Billboard Company Loses Suit Against Illinois Village

Earlier this month, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals struck down Tennessee’s outdoor advertising statute, finding it to be content-based in violation of the First Amendment.  The court’s ruling affirms an earlier ruling by a federal district court.

A billboard owner challenged the Tennessee Billboard Act after he posted a sign supporting the 2012 U.S. Olympic Team.  The sign was located on vacant land, and the owner had failed to secure a permit from the Tennessee Department of Transportation for the billboard, as required by the law.  The transportation department’s rationale for denying the permit was that it was not entitled to the law’s exception to permitting for on-premises signs, which the law generally defined as relating to the premises on which the sign was posted.  While the TBA was generally intended to apply exclusively to commercial off-premises speech, the state’s denial of a permit to the plaintiff appeared to apply to noncommercial speech, i.e., the owner’s support for the Olympic team.
Continue Reading In Sweeping Ruling, Federal Appeals Court Invalidates Tennessee Billboard Law

An Adams Outdoor billboard in Pennsylvania. Source: Adams Outdoor.

In a case that we’ve reported on previously, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals held last week that the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation’s rules pertaining to billboard permitting violate the First Amendment.  The court’s decision is yet another in a string of decisions from around the country making it more difficult for government to restrict the proliferation of off-premises signage.

To refresh our readers’ memory, Pennsylvania regulates billboards under its Outdoor Advertising Control Act of 1971.  That law prohibits the placement of billboards within 500 feet of a highway interchange or rest area, with an exception for official signs or on-premises “for sale or lease” signs.  The law also requires that a billboard advertiser obtain a permit from the state’s transportation department, but does not set forth a timeframe for such a permit to be processed.

Adams Outdoor, a billboard company, sought to install a billboard in Hanover Township, Pennsylvania.  After processing the permit application for over a year, the state’s transportation department  eventually denied the permit on the grounds that the sign violated the interchange restriction.  Adams challenged the interchange restriction and permitting procedures under the First Amendment, and also claimed that the billboard law was unconstitutionally vague.
Continue Reading Pennsylvania’s Billboard Rules Found to Violate First Amendment

The mural at the Lonsome Dove. Source: Bismarck Tribune.

This blog post was authored by Alexandra Haggarty, a summer clerk with Otten Johnson.  Alex is a rising 3L at the University of Colorado Law School.

A federal judge in North Dakota recently granted a temporary restraining order to enjoin the City of Mandan from enforcing a content-based ordinance regulating murals and signs.

The ordinance requires building owners to obtain a permit before displaying a sign or figurative wall mural.  A commission reviewing applications makes decisions based on guidelines and regulations, including those prohibiting murals that are commercial, have words as a dominant feature of the art, have political messages, or are on the front of the building.

The Lonesome Dove, a saloon that’s been a fixture on a main road for twenty-eight years, had until recently only decorated its exterior with beer ads.  Most recently, it had a Coors Light logo painted on the front wall.  Although the saloon never sought a permit for the logo, it was never cited for violation.  Seeking to reinvigorate its exterior, the saloon – not knowing it needed a permit – painted a 208 square-foot Western-themed “Lonesome Dove” mural on the front of the building in 2018. 
Continue Reading North Dakota City’s Mural Regulations Enjoined By Federal Court

The Bladensburg cross. Source: The Humanist.

In a widely-anticipated decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled late last month that a large concrete cross located on public property at a major intersection in Bladensburg, Maryland, could remain in place.  The nearly 90-year-old cross, which was placed to honor victims of World War I, had been challenged by an atheist organization as a violation of the First Amendment’s prohibition on establishment of religion.

In a fractured decision, seven of the Justices agreed that the cross could stay.  Writing for a plurality of the Court, Justice Alito argued that, although the Latin cross has a religious meaning, its longtime placement at a major intersection as a war memorial meant that it had taken on a secular meaning as well.  In light of this longstanding history, he concluded that the cross was not a violation of religious liberty.  In rendering his opinion, Justice Alito eschewed use of the widely-criticized Lemon test, developed by the Supreme Court in 1971, which looks at the government’s purpose and the effect of a regulation to determine whether an unconstitutional establishment of religion is created.  Justices Breyer and Kagan concurred in the opinion, noting that each Establishment Clause case must be reviewed individually and observing that no particular judicial test works in every situation.
Continue Reading Supreme Court Rules That Cross Monument Can Remain, Despite Religious Meaning

The Portland ordinance required a sign much like this one to be posted on an unreinforced masonry building. Source: Willamette Week.

This post was authored by Alexandra Haggarty.  Alex is a summer clerk at Otten Johnson, and a rising 3L at the University of Colorado Law School.

In a case challenging a Portland, Oregon ordinance, a federal judge granted a preliminary injunction to a group of building owners who would have been compelled to post a potentially misleading message.  The judge, suspecting the city was not forthcoming about its real motive behind the ordinance, found the requirements failed strict scrutiny and burdened First Amendment rights.

Portland has long encouraged owners of unreinforced masonry buildings (“URMs”) to retrofit and reinforce their properties to be stronger in the event of a major earthquake, but has remained unable to garner enough political and public support to mandate doing so.  Instead, it implemented an ordinance requiring owners of designated buildings to display exterior placards disclosing the risks of major earthquakes in URMs. The ordinance required the placard state: “This is an unreinforced masonry building. Unreinforced masonry buildings may be unsafe in the event of a major earthquake.”  The ordinance also required owners to (1) include a tenant notification provision in lease applications disclaiming risk and (2) document compliance with the ordinance.
Continue Reading Portland’s “Earthquake Warning” Placards Found To Violate First Amendment