BILLBOARD WATCH-Quite a few people seem to think that billboard ads for FX’s new TV series, “The Strain,” not only cross the line between good and bad taste but use the public viewscape to display inappropriate content to children. And some wonder why such content is allowed where parents have no control short of covering their children’s eyes when driving the city streets.
The answer is simple. The U.S. Supreme Court established years ago that cities and other government entities can regulate the size and location of billboards or even prohibit billboards altogether, but they cannot control the content of billboard ads on private property. Even attempts to limit certain kinds of billboard ads—for alcohol, to cite one example– in the proximity of schools, playgrounds, and other spots where children congregate have run up against constitutional challenges.
Lurid imagery a la “The Strain” is just one sort of billboard ad that people don’t want to see looming over their streets and sidewalks. Some others are ads that show people brandishing guns, ads for fast food and alcohol, and ads that portray women as objects of desire or in poses that suggest sexual violence.
Short of complaining to the sign companies and the advertisers themselves, actions that are of questionable effect as long as company profits go undisturbed, what can be done? One solution is obvious, if not quite simple, and that’s to get rid of as many billboards as possible and enforce an absolute ban on any new ones. Fewer billboards, less objectionable content out there in our public spaces.
Los Angeles took a step in that direction in 2002, when it banned new billboards and instituted a program to inventory and inspect all the city’s billboards to determine which ones either didn’t have permits or violated the terms of their permits. But various interests lobbied successfully for exceptions to the ban, and sign company lawsuits held up the inspection program, the end result being that very few billboards disappeared and many new ones went up, particularly in Hollywood and the downtown area.
Twelve years later, the inspection program has identified all the non-permitted and non-compliant billboards, and a new sign ordinance with fewer exceptions to the billboard ban is awaiting final action by a City Council committee. Unfortunately, the opportunity to significantly reduce the number of billboards in the city is in danger of being squandered.
The new sign ordinance would allow new billboards—off-site signs in the official parlance—only in special sign districts. And sign districts, which can now be located in any commercial zone, would be restricted to a total of 22 high-intensity commercial areas of the city including downtown, Universal City, Warner Center in the western San Fernando Valley, and parts of of San Pedro and Boyle Heights, among others. However, the ordinance also “grandfathers” a number of sign districts outside those areas that have been proposed by council members or landowners but haven’t been approved.
The new sign ordinance originally required sign companies or property owners wanting to put up new billboards in sign districts to remove existing billboards in surrounding areas at a ratio of one to one, computed by square footage of sign face. Under pressure from billboard companies, the City Council’s Planning and Land Use Management committee decided that a “community benefits” package including streetscape improvements and other public amenities could be substituted for up to half that billboard takedown requirement.
What is the probable effect of these “grandfathering” and “community benefits” amendments? That the public can expect more, not less, outdoor advertising in the public viewscape. And that’s not all.
The results of the citywide billboard inventory and inspection program made public earlier this year show that more than 1,500 of approximately 8,500 billboards in the city either don’t have permits or are out of compliance with their permits.
Citing difficulties in determining when the unpermitted billboards were put up and whether or not they had permits at one time, the city is proposing to grant all of them legal status. If approved, that means more than 700 billboards that may have been erected in disregard of law will go on broadcasting any kind of advertising for the foreseeable future.
At the same time the city has been debating these issues, lobbyists for sign companies have been pushing hard for some kind of deal to allow most of the 99 digital billboards turned off by court order last year to be either turned back on or relocated. Those lobbyists are also solicting political support for new digital billboards and offering unspecified revenue to the city in return. And finally, one billboard company—Lamar Advertising—has sued the city in an attempt to get permits for 45 new digital billboards.
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Digital billboards, of course, mean the same ads like those for “The Strain,” only brighter, more distracting, and delivered in a much more rapid-fire fashion. But saying no to more billboards, including digital billboards, is a way to say no to that kind of content delivered to a captive audience on our city streets.
After all, if you live or work in Santa Monica, Culver City, Pasadena or any of a number of Los Angeles-area cities, you won’t see billboard ads for “The Strain” because those cities banned new billboards long ago and got rid of most of the ones that remained. It’s the same in cities like Houston, which hasn’t allowed any new billboards for almost 40 years, and entire states like Vermont, Maine, Alaska, and Hawaii.
Why should advertisers be able to use public space for ads with images that can’t be turned off, fast forwarded, or put off-limits to children. Why indeed?
(Dennis Hathaway is the president of the Ban Billboard Blight coalition. He can be reached at: [email protected])
-cw
CityWatch
Vol 12 Issue 65
Pub: Aug 12, 2014
