INDReporter

Council kicks can on sign ordinance

by Walter Pierce

The Lafayette City-Parish Council Tuesday delayed a finalization vote on amending the zoning ordinance for political signs, deferring the matter to give consolidated government's legal and zoning departments time to further study the issue and offer a solution that won't gut the current ordinance.

The Lafayette City-Parish Council Tuesday delayed a finalization vote on amending the zoning ordinance for political signs, deferring the matter to give consolidated government's legal and zoning departments time to further study the issue and offer a solution that won't gut the current ordinance.

According to The Advocate, Councilman Kenneth Boudreaux, the amendments' sponsor, pulled the ordinance at Tuesday's meeting.

Lafayette's Zoning Commission emailed council members last week to express concern that the proposed amendments - removing the 90-days-before-an-election time restriction as well as limits on the size of signs on private property - could lead to a proliferation of visual clutter.

Temporary political signs became a political issue for the council in the spring when the city mailed letters to several candidates in the fall election warning them that their signs were in violation of the zoning ordinance. Some of those candidates, who were distributing signs as early as March, questioned whether limits on political signs constitute an infringement on First Amendment speech.

By deferring the matter the council is more or less buying time until next year because in a couple of weeks the Nov. 4 election will be 90 days away and the political signs will comport with the current ordinance.

Read more here at The Advocate.