Sign Wars

Well, I thought that this whole thing would just go away when city hall decided to enforce the law, but it appears that a few want to fight a little longer. For those that would like to play a game of "one upmanship" this is going to be fun because I have a feeling that our city staff is now paying attention. It's a shame that a few in our city are TRYING to make our city look bad instead of just following the rules. Enjoy the game, and I hope that you don't get our BOMA to take a closer look at making our sign ordinance even MORE strict in the coming months. Then the "game" will really get fun, and then it will start hitting your wallet.

Enjoy...and here we go!

City Is Serious About Rules For Signs
By Richard Conn, Staff Writer
The Tennessean: January 12, 2005

Signs, signs, everywhere signs. In Spring Hill during the weekends, they are as much a part of the landscape as trees and grass and subdivisions.

Clusters of directional signs advertising new residential developments abound, from Buckner and Duplex roads to Highway 31.

That's because the city has a long-standing informal accord with local developers which allows them to erect signs to their subdivisions, but only from 4 p.m. on Fridays to 8 a.m. on Mondays.

When the privilege is abused - which happened recently when a Realtor placed a sign on a state right of way - the city uproots the sign and keeps it at City Hall.

So, that's how it all started..."the city has a long-standing informal accord with local developers which allows them to erect signs to their subdivisions". So, there's been an unsigned CODE, for lack of better term, 'stay on the city's good side and you won't have any problems advertising your subdivision anywhere you like'.

Here's an interesting situation that occurred a few years ago that some of you might recall:

Sign Reported Stolen Turns Up At City Hall
By Sue McClure, Staff Writer
The Tennessean: July 8, 2004

Saying the sheriff had run afoul of the law, a couple of city slickers "stole" the lawman's sign promoting a rodeo this weekend.

"I'll tell you where his sign is," Spring Hill Mayor Ray Williams said yesterday. "It's up here at City Hall, around back, by the Dumpsters."

"He was violating the sign ordinance, and codes inspectors took it down."

On Tuesday, an angry Maury County Sheriff Enoch George appealed to the public for help in finding the "low-down" person who took the 32-foot canvas sign that had been tethered to a low-bed trailer by nine ropes.

The sign was advertising a special rodeo the sheriff is holding tomorrow and Saturday at Maury County Park to raise money for the county's reserve deputies and school resource officer program, which puts a sheriff's deputy in every school.

When the sheriff discovered that the city of Spring Hill had his sign, he hit the roof.

"They don't have a license to steal," he thundered. "And state law overrides city law, meaning stealing someone's property is a worse offense than a sign ordinance."

The mayor said city officials tried to contact George five times to tell him he needed to get a city permit to display his sign even though it was on private property along Saturn Parkway.

"I don't know how they couldn't reach me," George said. "I'm the sheriff. If they had wanted to reach me, they could have."

George sent Lt. Jim Brady to Spring Hill to retrieve the sign and get a proper permit to display it.

But after the brouhaha with Spring Hill, the sheriff decided to take his sign out of the city limits, posting it at Beasley's Landscaping on Highway 31 within Columbia's city limits.

"And, yes, I checked with the city of Columbia and got a full permission to post the sign," George said.

"We're not going to have the problem we had with Spring Hill."

Again, we're back to enforcing codes BY CONVENIENCE. Maury County Sheriff George tethers a 32-foot canvas sign to a trailer, citing a violation of the city sign ordinance, city officials take the sign down. After looking through the zoning ordinance, I suppose this was the logic for the code violation...

Definition of a sign:

Any...pictorial presentation (including illustration or decoration)...which: 1. Is a structure or any part thereof, or is attached to, painted on, or in any other manner represented on a building or other structure, and 2. Is used to announce, direct attention, or advertise.

And, a definition of Structure:

Anything constructed, assembled, or erected, the use of which require permanent or semipermanent location on the ground, or attached to something having a permanent or semi-permanent location on the ground.

(Such as a trailer, or a moving truck?)

Then, there's the part where ALL SIGNS must have a PERMIT:


Do you think that Alderman Raines and Hometown Reality has a PERMIT for this?


Now, the ball is now in your court.

Hopefully in April we don't have to amend all of the codes to get a very few to play by the rules. Is it really that hard to just do what is right?