The Fourteenth Amendment makes the First Amendment’s freedom-of-speech provision applicable to states and their political subdivisions. While many sign codes begin as content neutral “time, place, and manner” regulations (or “police power” exercises), further analysis often reveals the ordinance violates First Amendment “free speech” guarantees. Even in cases where the subject ordinance is not per se […]
Continue readingCategory Archives: 1st Amendment / Freedom of Speech
Signs, Legal Rights and Aesthetic Considerations (1972)
There are three general ways in which cultural constraints are enforced: through the use of police powers, eminent domain and taxation. Download Signs. Legal Rights and Aesthetic Considerations
Continue reading
The Sign User’s Guide – A Marketing Guide (1988)
Sections include: Functions of Signs, The Importance of Signs, Sign Design, Selecting the Appropriate Type of Sign, Designing a Sign, How Much Should a Sign Cost?, Choosing the Copy for a Sign, The Importance of Sign Size to Advertising Effectiveness, Why Businesses Need Signage, The Importance of Marketing, Types of Advertising Media, Standard Measures of […]
Continue reading
What’s Your Signage? (2004)
How On-Premise Signs Help Small Businesses Tap into a Hidden Profit Center A handbook developed by The New York State Small Business Development Center and the Signage Foundation for Communications Excellence. Download What’s Your Signage?
Continue reading
Analysis of Legal and Legislative Strategies
The following article originally appeared in the August 1987 issue of Signs of the Times magazine. By R. James Claus, Ph.D., Karen E. Claus, Ph.D. Donald W. Large, L.L.B. The history of sign-control legislation shows that certain approaches are successful and produce fair regulation, which benefits the entire community. Industry representatives who utilize positive strategies […]
Continue reading
Bob Aran Reflects on 30-year Sign-Legislation Career
The following article originally appeared in the February 2004 issue of Signs of the Times magazine. Were you an attorney first, who became interested in sign codes, or did you have an interest in signs that ended up being sign-code based? I majored in interpersonal relationships (literary related) during my undergraduate work at Pepperdine University. […]
Continue reading
Tennessee Billboard Law Ruled Unconstitutional
A 45-year-old, outdoor-advertising act in Tennessee has been declared unconstitutional by a Memphis district judge, because of content-neutrality issues. An April 3, 2017 article in U. S. Today states, “U.S. District Judge Jon P. McCalla said the 1972 law ‘does not survive First Amendment scrutiny’ because it bans some forms of commercial and non-commercial speech […]
Continue reading
FASI Board Member Weinstein Speaks at National Planning Conference
Alan Weinstein, an acknowledged expert on planning, who holds a joint faculty appointment at Cleveland State University’s Cleveland-Marshall College of Law and Maxine Goodman Levin College of Urban Affairs, and also serves as director of the colleges’ Law & Public Policy Program, will speak at two separate sessions at the 2017 American Planning Association’s National […]
Continue reading
What the Street Graphics Books Say About Signs
In 1971, the American Planning Association (APA) began distributing a book called Street Graphics and the Law, which was authored by Daniel Mandelker and William Ewald. It recommended the uncompensated taking of signs and governmental control of signs’ design, message and content. The authors stated that their conclusions were substantially based on 1956 research conducted […]
Continue reading
What Does a Business Owner Think About the Bozeman, MT Sign Code?
Roger Koopman wrote an editorial for the Bozeman Daily Chronicle a quarter century ago. Does it sound like it could be written today? This appeared in the February 1991 issue of Signs of the Times magazine. One of the more interesting hypocrisies of contemporary liberalism is the ease with which its followers can advocate a […]
Continue reading