sign codes

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Signs on the pedestrian overpass in Campbell, Wisconsin. Source: Milwaukee Journal.

Late last week, in a case that involved made-for-TV shenanigans by a local police officer, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a town’s total ban on signs, flags, and banners within 100 feet of an interstate highway could survive with respect to overhead signs, but remanded the case for additional proceedings with respect to other parts of the ban.

Campbell, Wisconsin bans all signs, flags, and banners along interstate highways.  The town enacted its regulation after members of the community hung political protest banners containing messages commonly identified with the Tea Party on a pedestrian overpass over Interstate 90.

Following the enactment of the regulation, the local police began issuing citations to individuals displaying signs along the highway.  Some of the individual sign-posters took videos of the police issuing citations—including in response to the protesters’ display of American flags and other patriotic signs along the interstate highway.  Concerned about the videos, in an apparent attempt at vigilante justice, the local police chief posted the name and email address of one of the Tea Party sign-posters on same-sex dating and pornographic websites.  The police chief also took to local newspapers to accuse the man of failing to pay his taxes. 
Continue Reading Amid Interstate Overpass Soap Opera, Seventh Circuit Says No Empirical Evidence Required to Support Sign Regulation

Sam Shaw and one of his signs. Source: Indiana Public Media.

Last week, a federal district court in Indiana ruled that the enforcement of the City of Bedford’s sign ordinance would not be enjoined, finding that the sign code was content neutral, supported by a significant governmental interest, and narrowly tailored.  The court’s denial of the preliminary injunction indicates that the ordinance is likely to survive constitutional scrutiny.
Continue Reading Indiana Town’s Sign Ordinance Withstands Motion for Preliminary Injunction

One of International Outdoor’s billboards in the Detroit area. Source: International Outdoor.

Late last month, a federal court in Michigan granted in part and denied in part a motion to dismiss First Amendment claims filed by a billboard company, International Outdoor, against the City of Troy.  The billboard company claimed that Troy’s sign ordinance was content based and unconstitutional, and that it imposed an unconstitutional prior restraint.  The city moved to dismiss the plaintiff’s claims, and further argued that the billboard company lacked standing to bring the claims.

The court first reviewed the city’s challenge to International Outdoor’s standing, which asserted that International Outdoor failed to plead redressability.  In a short response, the court held that, because the challenge was a facial challenge to the entire sign ordinance, if the court were to strike down the entire ordinance, the plaintiff’s injury would be redressed.
Continue Reading Billboard Company’s Challenge to Michigan Sign Code Survives Motion to Dismiss

The proposed billboard in this case was over three times the maximum sign area permitted by the City's sign code.
The proposed billboard in this case was over three times the maximum sign area permitted by the City’s sign code.

In a recent decision from the Michigan Court of Appeals, an applicant challenged a provision that gave the board of zoning appeals (BZA) discretion to approve signs that do not comply with the sign ordinance. The applicant, who had submitted an application for a sign that did not comply with the sign ordinance, brought an appeal to the BZA in accordance with a provision that said the BZA may grant a special permit for signs that do not otherwise comply only if the proposed sign meets certain specific standards. Those standards generally required that the sign be consistent with the purpose and intent of the sign code, be compatible with the surrounding neighborhood, and not be detrimental to the public safety or welfare or any adjacent land use, but reserved the discretion to grant the special permit to the BZA. The applicant’s facial challenge alleged that the discretion to grant the special permit constituted a prior restraint that “has the potential for becoming a means of suppressing a particular point of view.” The court disagreed, noting that the applicant could have received a permit for a billboard that met the sign code without applying for a special permit (and thus being subject to the BZA’s discretion), and moreover that the discretion, absent any evidence of an unconstitutional application, was sufficiently limited by the requirement that a proposed sign meet the specifically enumerated standards for approval.
Continue Reading Optional “Special Permit” Process Does Not Place Unbridled Discretion in Government

For those wading through the sign regulation muddle post Reed v. Town of Gilbert, check out my latest article in The Urban Lawyer, Sign Regulation After Reed: Suggestions for Coping with Legal Uncertainty.  Co-authored with Professor Alan Weinstein of Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, the article provides practical advice to local government planners…

Brigitte Vosse, a Manhattan designer and resident of New York City’s Upper West Side, can no longer display her illuminated peace sign in the window of her top-floor condominium unit in the famed 111-year-old Ansonia building, now that a federal district court has ruled that New York City’s ban on illuminated signs extending more than 40 feet above curb level has been found content neutral and a proper time, place, and manner restriction on speech.  Although the law in question excepted flags, banners, or pennants on lots containing civic, philanthropic, educational, or religious community facilities, the federal district court and the Second Circuit Court of Appeals both found that the law was content neutral.  Back at the district court, the court found that the restriction on illuminated signs above 40 feet was supported by a significant governmental purpose—aesthetic quality—and that the restriction was narrowly tailored to that interest.  The court also found that, because Vosse could display a non-illuminated version of her sign, ample alternative channels were available for conveying her message.
Continue Reading New York City Can Force Resident to Remove High-Rise Peace Sign

The Village of Downers Grove, Illinois survived federal and state law challenges to its sign code after a federal district court found the code to be content neutral under the standard articulated in the Supreme Court’s decision in Reed v. Town of Gilbert.  Plaintiff Robert Peterson owns a business called Leibundguth Storage & Van Service, Inc., which painted large signs advertising its business on the walls of its brick building in Downers Grove.  The village’s sign ordinance banned painted wall signs and limited the size and number of wall signs.  Peterson argued that the sign code was content based because it exempted government signs, railroad signs, address signs, noncommercial flags, real estate signs, and decorations, among other sign types, from the village’s permitting requirement.  
Continue Reading Illinois Village Survives Sign Code Challenge