MOUNT VERNON — It did not take long on Tuesday for Mount Vernon’s Board of Zoning Appeals to deny a request by Rural King for eight additional signs at 1500 Coshocton Ave.
The signs represent eight brands that Rural King will carry in its store; each sign is 3-foot-by-8-foot for a total of 192 additional square feet of signage. The additional signs exceed the maximum number of signs allowed and the maximum square footage allowed under the city’s recently revised sign code. Mike Davis of Kessler Sign Co. spoke for Rural King at the hearing.
“I guess my main point is that it’s 800 feet away from the road and you can’t see it,” said Davis of the signs. “If it was sitting right down on the road and you see a whole host of these things, I’d understand.”
BZA member Don Carr questioned what would prevent other stores in the plaza from doing the same thing if the board granted Rural King’s request.
“The reason the ordinance is there is because many people feel that signs can almost take on a sense of noise. In other words, pollution. Too many signs is what we are trying to control,” he said.
“You’d never know the signs were there until you drove into the store,” said Davis.
“We just developed a new sign code and we’re probably heading down the wrong lane if we approve this,” said board member Phil Herald. “I’m sure it looks fine, but we’ve had issues with signage in the past. We did all of this work to come up with what we felt was a good, reasonable sign code, and I’m just not comfortable with abusing it right off the bat. So that’s why I’m saying no.”
En route to reaching the decision to deny the additional signage, BZA Vice-Chairman Michael Percy asked Law Director Rob Broeren whether branding fits any of the permitted sign contents under the new code.
“The issue, I think, is going to arise about whether or not we can go and restrict that sort of commercial speech,” responded Broeren. “There will be a potential first amendment issue should we determine that this sort of messaging is not allowed at all.”
Broeren said that given the broad categories allowed, branding signs should probably be allowed. As he has not yet researched the issue, he said did not feel comfortable “going out on that limb” to restrict branding signs at this point.
