First, the ban on banners should have been lifted pending adoption of the new ordinance, as was proposed by Councilmember Teresa Barth, and supported by Councilmember Mark Muir at the 8/22/12 Council Meeting when current Mayor, Jerome Stocks, suddenly and unilaterally appointed a subcommittee of Muir and outgoing Councilmember Jim Bond, further delaying resolution of the legal issues.

It already took “outside counsel,” Randal Morrison over four months (from April 11 to August 22) to come up with his report on sign law, as applicable to banners or signs in the public right of way. The previous law was to be revamped because Council determined, after receiving letters from the ACLU and Coast Law Group, that it should not have “unfettered discretion” to interpret the previous code, which never mentioned “political figures” to mean that an image on the back of the Arts Alive Banners, in tribute to then recently deceased Councilmember and former Mayor Maggie Houlihan, a beloved community member, must be covered in order for a permit to be issued through the City Manager’s office.

What the Subcommitte has done under the legal “auspices” of City Attorney Glenn Sabine, and his lawfirm partner, Randal Morrison, is to attempt to codify the exact abuse of discretion to which lawyers and the general public had previously objected.

Morrison has basically recommended that NO “third party,” or non-profit groups should be allowed to put banners on “city infrastructure” (the lightposts, etc, in the public right of way) as that would create a public forum, and regulating “viewpoint” would be “complicated.”

It’s not only “complicated,” it’s UNCONSTITUTIONAL! The message on signage allowed by non-rofits (which SHOULD BE ALLOWED, as is traditional within our city) cannot be regulated to the point of disallowing past living “political figures” as defined by the proposed sign law ordinance, to be depicted. That is overstepping the Contsitution.

According to Morrison, Council could legally disallow promoting or campaigning for religious or political events. That could be interpreted, reasonably, in my opinion (I’m not a lawyer, though) to mean that current candidates or current elected officials could not be depicted as that constitutes an implied endorsement, in election cycle years.

Further, current code should not be suspended by Council “at any time.” Council did exactly that, already, by banning banners, upon Stocks improper conditioning of his second to Councilmember Mark Muir’s motion to allow Maggie Houlihan’s image to be uncovered, which he made on 4/11/12/ Stocks seconded, stating no new applications would be accepted for signs in the public right of way, pending adoption of new policy through revising Encinitas Municipal Code relative to sign law.

As we know, Stocks has no problem putting up campaign signs early, himself not following current sign code NOT suspended. Any time any portion of current code is suspended, that should legally require two public hearings, just as two readings at two public hearings are required for creating a new ordinance or revising a current ordinance by amending it. Suspending code is a form of amending current code; that is only logical and fair!

There should be no short cuts in public process required by administrators and politicians. City Attorney Glenn Sabine was present at the sign code subcommittee meeting, Morison was not. The ordinance presented on 9/26 was not in alignment with Morrison’s recommendations in his 8/22 “staff report.” It seems to me that the new proposed language is simply “damage control,” an improper attempt to justify a previous abuse of discretion by codifying the wrongful reasoning into City law!