Tag Archives: signs

City Council, City of Peoria, Signs

Van Auken misses “Golden” opportunity

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There I was Tuesday, beating the newspaper against my head after reading this:

The city’s Planning & Growth Management Department believes [Golden Corral’s] proposed sign is too big, much more so than what is allowed in the city ordinance. Proposals have the sign at 40-foot, 215-square-feet tall [sic]. The city requires 25-foot-tall, 70-square-foot signs for businesses such as Golden Corral […]

Russ Hruby of RJH Management Corp. said the company is willing to meet whatever restrictions are decided upon by the zoning commission or City Council. […]

[Second District City Councilwoman Barbara Van Auken says,] “We’re going to work with them and give them as close to the size as they want,” she said. “That area is a little unique in that way that there is a lot of big signs on University. While we like to get signs smaller, we have to be realistic. As new businesses locate there, they have big signs to compete with.”

Think about that for a minute and let it sink in:

Here’s a developer who is locating on University Street between War Memorial Drive and Forrest Hill — a stretch of road that is the epitome of poor urban design, and probably the most often-cited example of visual clutter in the City. Presumably, city officials would like to see the area improved and would jump at the opportunity to start scaling down the signs to bring them in line with the sign ordinance.

And it gets better! The developer says he’s “willing to meet whatever restrictions are decided upon by the zoning commission or City Council” — unlike Westlake Shopping Center which intimidated the City Council into giving it a big ordinance-busting sign by claiming its then-secret tenant (later revealed to be Fresh Market) would not locate there if they couldn’t have a humongous sign. No, this developer is very happy with the City, and doesn’t perceive the city as unfriendly to business. In fact, he’s quoted as saying, “It’s not an adversarial position at all…. Peoria has been (accommodating).”

What an opportunity! No threats, no intimidation. A new business on University street willing to abide by the code! Could this be the start of cleaning up University and reducing visual clutter? Could this business’s sign compliance be used as a shining, positive example for other businesses who locate there in the future?

Enter Barbara Van Auken, Second District Council Representative.

“We’re going to work with them and give them as close to the size as they want,” she said [emphasis mine]. What? Why in the world would you want to do that? “That area is a little unique in that way that there is a lot of big signs on University….” Hmmm, “unique” is one word for it; “ugly” is another. “Blighted” fits the bill, too.

“While we like to get signs smaller, we have to be realistic. As new businesses locate there, they have big signs to compete with.” I’m not sure whether this is doublespeak or just plain self-contradiction. If Councilwoman Van Auken really would “like to get signs smaller,” then she logically would not “give them as close to the size as they want,” which is three times the size allowed by ordinance and twice as big as the McDonald’s sign across the street, especially after the developer has already stated for the record that he’s “willing to meet whatever restrictions are decided.”

So the bottom line is that signs will continue to escalate in size along University, unless the rest of the council does the right thing and upholds the sign ordinance. The unwritten rule on the council is that you always vote for what the district council member wants for a project in his or her district. That’s a poor policy in general, and one that definitely should be disregarded in this case.

For those of you who like visuals, I drew this in Google Sketch-Up to show you a comparison of the maximum sign allowed by ordinance (on the left) versus the size of the sign requested by Golden Corral (on the right). These are to scale. Note also the size of an average human at the bottom:

City of Peoria, State Legislation, State of Illinois

State eliminates time limits for campaign signs

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Roof-top signs, “floppy-man” signs, and temporary banners were just some of the signs discussed at Tuesday’s Sign Review Committee meeting. But one thing the committee can do little about is political signs.

A new Illinois law set to take effect January 1, 2011, limits the city’s home rule authority to limit how long political signs can be displayed. HB3785 “[p]rovides that a municipality may place reasonable restrictions on the size of outdoor political campaign signs on residential property,” but also “[p]rovides that no municipality may prohibit the display of outdoor political campaign signs on residential property during any period of time.” The bill was passed unanimously by the Illinois House and Senate and signed by the Governor on June 3. The city currently requires that political campaign signs “be removed within seven days after an election.” That will have to be changed. Apparently, campaign signs can be left up year round starting next year. Won’t that make the city look fantastic?

Most of the discussion on other temporary signs revolved around how better to enforce the current ordinance during a time when the city is cutting staff. Ideas included lowering or eliminating the fee (currently $75) to apply for a temporary sign license (to improve compliance), utilizing city workers who are already driving around the city (such as police or public works employees) to call in violations to the sign ordinance when they see them, and partnering with printers and sign companies to educate those purchasing signs about the city’s rules.

The committee also recommended permitting inflatable signs so they can be approved administratively through the licensing process instead of through the Zoning Commission via the special use process. However, if permitted in this way, the change ordinance would add size limitations and prohibit “floppy man” types of signs (here’s an example).

City of Peoria

City take your signs? Switch to handbills

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As I mentioned earlier, the city is cracking down on signs in the public right-of-way. (For those of you who are wondering, the citation in the municipal code is 17.10.a.(8), “Private signs are prohibited in the public right-of-way.”) I believe this is to cut down on visual clutter and, arguably, litter.

So it’s ironic that on Tuesday’s council agenda, there’s this little item:

ITEM NO. 3, H. Communication from the Interim City Manager and Corporation Counsel Requesting Adoption of an ORDINANCE Amending CHAPTER 13 of the Code of the City of Peoria Pertaining to HANDBILLS.

What is the amendment, you ask? It’s to repeal a law against distributing handbills under windshield wipers. Why? Because the laws on the books against distributing handbills have been found unconstitutional:

In August, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals held ordinances exactly like Sections 13-50 and 13-51 to be unconstitutional because the City of Granite City, Illinois had not done a study to determine that the ordinances actually reduced litter.

Section 13-50 makes it illegal to put handbills on vehicles, primarily being directed at the placement of handbills on windshield wipers. Section 13-51 prohibits depositing handbills on unoccupied premises. Repeal of these ordinances places the City in compliance with the constitutional requirements. Should repeal of these ordinances lead to an increase in litter, then a study can be done and the ordinances can be re-enacted based upon findings by the City Council.

So now, instead of driving by signs for this or that cause or candidate, we’ll come back from a couple hours’ worth of shopping to find those same messages under our windshield wipers instead.

And do you know what we should do with those handbills when we receive them? If I’m reading this court ruling correctly, it appears the proper thing to do is throw them on the ground.* That way, the city will find that distribution of handbills increases litter, and thus make a prohibition against them constitutional.

Don’t worry about the littering.* City Crews can pick that up while they’re out gathering signs.

*Note: For those of you who are sarcasm-challenged, I’m not literally advocating littering. I’m just demonstrating the absurdity of the situation.

City of Peoria

More signs collected

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From a press release:

City Crews continue to collect signs that have been placed in the right of way.

Today, crews removed 80 signs from locations throughout the City. The locations included University, Knoxville, MacArthur Highway, McClure, Forrest Hill and Madison.

Crews will continue to collect signs. Citizens can assist the City by calling our PeoriaCares line at 494-2273, and letting us know about signs that may be in the public right of way.

Since we now know that “City Crews” (an interesting title given its capitalization yet lack of specificity) have the time for this effort to purge our right-of-ways of the scourge of illegal signage, might they also be available for other, perhaps more important, city-improvement initiatives? Like code enforcement, for instance?

City of Peoria

What’s your sign?

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Whatever it is, if it was placed in the public right-of-way, chances are it’s now at the City’s Public Works facility:

City crews have picked up a total of 69 signs that were placed in the public right of way. The signs are being stored at the City’s Public Works facility on Dries Lane. Signs can be retrieved from Public Works over the next 10 days. After that time, the signs will be discarded.

Pride is picking up in Peoria.