LA’s Citywide Sign Ordinance: By, For and Of Special Interests

IRATE PRIVATE CITIZEN’S OPEN LETTER-I write this letter not as a representative of my local homeowners association or neighborhood council, both of which have come out in support of the sign ordinance that limits new signage to sign districts in specified commercially zoned areas and who seek enforcement of and the issuance of citations to signs that are out of compliance with their permits or that lack appropriate permits.  Letters sent under the cover of our community organizations are written more delicately with emotions buried beneath more thoughtful word choices. 

Rather, I write this correspondence as an irate private citizen, one who is never surprised but often disappointed at the lengths that the LA City Council will go to demonstrate its loyalty to special interests over the interests of the city as a whole and its many citizen stakeholders.  It comes as no surprise to me that this Committee would schedule consideration of the Sign Ordinance and newly released reports from the Planning Department and CLA's office on the last day of session before summer break. This isn't the first instance such timing has occurred leaving so many members of the public, of neighborhood councils, etc. without adequate notice of a hearing on an issue of great public interest and concern.  No doubt the outdoor advertising industry lobbyists and representatives had ample notice of Tuesday's PLUM hearing in advance of the notice we received Friday afternoon when the agenda was posted.   

Too many electeds in this City have demonstrated their allegiance to the outdoor advertising industry as it pollutes our vistas with advertisements-- all messages protected by first amendment rights but which, none the less, too often leave the recipient communities defenseless against sometimes noxious messages.  The visual and light and night-sky pollution are also burdens each impacted community must bear.  My observations here do not even begin to raise the issues related to digital signs and traffic safety.  Here we are in Los Angeles, with DOT seeking to implement a ZERO FATALITIES goal, and this PLUM Committee is seeking to initiate a process that will allow for dangerous and distracting digital billboards to be placed across the City?  Who will protect the growing number of bike riders and pedestrians when digital signs distract drivers from their primary duty of watching the road?  

The Sign Ordinance has suffered through and survived a very long and demanding consideration process.  It has been sitting in the PLUM Committee far too long.  It needs to be adopted as it has been drafted without these new "concepts" and sent to full Council.  Neither "side" has gotten all that they wish and this is likely a sign of balanced legislation.  However, recent efforts as contained in the Planning Dept. report to PLUM (at PLUM's request) which allow for digital sign placement outside of sign districts via a conditional use permit process is something that is completely unacceptable.  That notion, along with the possible granting of amnesty to unpermitted and out of compliance billboards must be backed out of current discussions.  It should go no further. If, however, further consideration is pursued, it should be sent to the City Planning Commission where a new process can be started to open public debate on these matters. Future changes can only be considered within a transparent and reasonable framework for public input and debate.   

Some of you are aware of the painful and costly journey we refer to as the SIGN WARS the City of Los Angeles has endured over many years.  You are to be reminded that many of those battles were self-inflicted --- the result of badly crafted policies, secret agreements and poor judgment.  The City has now worked its way out of that muck and mire and has a clear path for regulation and a regulatory framework.  A conditional use process will only undermine the hard won consistency that a sound and legally defensible policy requires.  

Sadly, the outdoor advertisers and, perhaps some electeds, would rather have sign regulation be the result of litigation and the resulting paralysis that often accompanies it.  The citizens of Los Angeles expect more of their POLICY MAKERS.  We do not wish to see the sign regulatory process descend into new legal morasses. You have received legal advice as to what can be enforced at this time and what your path of action can be.  It is time to clean up this chapter of the City's regulatory experience and move forward, not backwards.   

Please demonstrate that you have both the courage and the wisdom to act in the best interest of the City.  Do the work of the people, for the people.  Do not seek to implement special interest legislation to favor billboard interests and the wishes of those who do their bidding.      

Finally, I wish to remind you of a topic of considerable interest to the Council.   When you wonder why citizens of Los Angeles fail to vote in elections, I urge you to think back to this day.  Think about the message that you are sending to the voters and potential voters.  Who do you represent when you consider a motion to treat one special interest above all others and forgive them their sins, many of which were intentional?  What message do you send when you consider a motion to circumvent years of policy consideration and discussion at the end of a process that represents the give and take process that results in reasonable regulation?   

When will members of the Council stop behaving as though the only constituents of sign regulation are the actual companies that profit from the signs?   

I urge you to vote NO on the proposed billboard amnesty and the proposed conditional use permit process for new digital billboards. While those items could be sent to the City Planning Commission for further discussion and debate, they should die at your meeting having been recognized as the inappropriate introduction of special interest legislation that seeks to undermine consistent regulation -- thus opening the City up to the costly, time-consuming risk of litigation from an industry that appears to rely on litigation as a commonly used tool in their backpack of business practices.  

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Note:  At the PLUM meeting, the committee members voted to forward the proposal for amnesty for all out-of-compliance billboards and those without permits to the City Planning Commission for their consideration.   

The Committee requested the Planning Department to draft a digital off-site sign program (allowing digital signs outside of sign districts) and sent one version of the ordinance to the City Attorney for drafting with major issues clouded/unresolved such as the requirements for those sign districts that are being recommended for “grandfathering” that have not had any entitlement hearings and what that effort to “grandfather” them might mean.  

One speaker at the hearing requested an independent study by DWP as to the energy usage of digital signs (do digital signs contribute to an unsustainable city?) but there was no committee referral to the DWP for action and no outreach to the LA Dept. of Transportation re: their “Zero Fatality” program as to whether using digital billboards to advertise the latest hit and run accidents (as proposed by one speaker) would actually help to catch hit and run drivers or would lead to additional accidents due to driver distraction.   There were some comments related to on-site signage although the City purposely earlier had removed consideration of on-site signage to a separate process. 

 Representatives for the billboard industry had even more requests including a reduction in proposed fines for non-compliance.  The ordinance’s fines are based on those established in New York City and reflect this industry’s past failure to comply with City laws in the past.  When fines are insignificant, they become a mere cost of doing business rather than an incentive to play by the rules.  

The City convened a Visioning Group on billboards whose work was facilitated by an outside consultant in 2013.  At the conclusion of that process, the Planning Dept. recommended the formation and staffing of a sign unit so that sign-related policy could be crafted in a deliberate and transparent process.  That process was estimated to take two years once the unit was established. Efforts to draft policy by committee directive within a 60 day deadline appear counter to those earlier stated goals.  

 

(Barbara Broide is the President of the Westwood South of Santa Monica Blvd. Homeowners Association, a member of the Westside Neighborhood Council and a Board Member of Coalition to Ban Billboard Blight.)

-cw

 

 

CityWatch

Vol 13 Issue 54

Pub: Jul 3, 2015