So far, the Albany City Commission appears to be wasting a select group of citizens’ time – this time on the sign code
“And the sign said, ‘Long haired freaky people need not apply’ So I tucked my hair up under my hat and I went in to ask him why He said, ‘You look like a fine upstanding young man, I think you’ll do’ So I took off my hat I said, “Imagine that, huh, me working for you’”
— Five Man Electrical Band (1970)
I remember being 9 or 10, riding home from school in my big brother’s fluorescent purple VW bug.
The stereo was blaring. “American Pie” had just ended. No one knew all the words, but we certainly pretended to.
Then came the “The Sign Song,” as we called it.
The teen-agers knew all the words, but I didn’t. I would hum along, until the end of the first verse. Then we’d all scream, “Huh, me working for you!”
I was an activist in the making. All 4 feet, 2 of me. Like my bro, I was a chip off the old block. (Around that time, my brother suggested that a fund-raiser be held to buy George Wallace’s assailant another bullet, if you get my drift.)
I’ve grown, albeit barely, since then. But “The Sign Song” still resonates – in more ways than one.
(Chorus) “Sign Sign everywhere a sign Blocking out the scenery breaking my mind Do this, don’t do that, can’t you read the sign”
When it comes to taking positions, choosing sides or otherwise being politically and socially active, I’m out there, on the record, perhaps as much as anyone in this community.
But my take on drafting a new Albany sign ordinance isn’t necessarily as it appears. To the surprise of many, including the namesake of the radio show (Wake Up Albany With Matt Patrick) that I co-host, I’m not against signs – at least, I don’t think I am.
Sure, I have raised more stink about the city’s sign code than anyone. And I’ve asked the question a hundred times – while I was a city hall insider, and since: Why, for goodness’ sake, do we have a sign code if it’s not going to be enforced?
City Attorney Nathan Davis’ perpetual answer – that the sign law is unconstitutional – has always beckoned the obvious question: You’re the municipal lawyer; why don’t you write a new one? Because, Davis says, the issue is a political hot-potato, and local elected officials don’t have the will to take it on.
So, should billboards and on-premises signs change seconds every 10 seconds, once a minute, or once a day? Heck, I don’t know. I’m not even sure that I care. Sure, I want my town to look great, but I also want businesses to make a ton of money. It’s a tossup, to me. That’s how I feel, really: Both sides of the sign debate – all points of view – are arguable, as far as I’m concerned. I came live with whatever the community comes up with.
“And the sign said anybody caught trespassing would be shot on sight So I jumped on the fence and yelled at the house, Hey! what gives you the right To put up a fence to keep me out or to keep mother nature in If God was here, he’d tell you to your face, man you’re some kinda sinner”
When I heard that that Albany was going to rewrite its sign law, I naively got pumped up about it. What a great way to engage the community, I thought. And if new laws are adopted, I figured, certainly they’ll start being enforced. Finally. And maybe the city will even start complying with the law. (By all accounts, Civic Center ’s marquee clearly is contrary to city code.)
My first clue that the sign issue wasn’t going to be resolved after a genuine, inclusive discussion was that the city hired a consultant to write the new law. My bubble quickly had burst. When we pay our city attorneys and their staff more than $1 million every four years, and there are model sign ordinances posted on Websites throughout the country — including on the state Department of Community Affairs’ home page – why in the world do we need to spend taxpayer money on a consultant?
Then the city formed a so-called task force. Remember the last time we had a task force? Consolidation was the topic. The task force – labeled a “study commission” — met and met and met. It hired a consultant, reached a consensus, and made a recommendation that voters decide what form of government the city should have.
And as Davis would put it, not one of his bosses – the mayor and six commissioners – has had the political will to make a motion endorsing the recommendation.
What a disgusting waste of time. What an insult to the entire citizenry, particularly the task force members.
(Bridge) “Now, hey you Mister! can’t you read, you got to have a shirt and tie to get a seat You can’t even watch, no you can’t eat, you ain’t suppose to be here Sign said you got to have a membership card to get inside Uh!”
Well, indeed, my fears have been fully realized.
On Tuesday, at the first meeting of the so-called sign task force, I learned that the city doesn’t plan to comply with its own law. Already. No matter what the new law says, the city will be exempt from it, said Howard Brown, the city’s planning and development services director.
And when representatives of the sign industry were asked to weigh in at the meeting on the issue of the central issue at hand – how often billboards and other signs should be allowed to change images — a stunning revelation surfaced. It appears that the task force isn’t going to be asked to reach a consensus, at all. Instead, Brown says that he’s sticking to his guns that billboards and other signs should be allowed to display a new image no once a minute, at the most.
Meanwhile, task force member Judy Bowles, the Keep Albany-Dougherty Beautiful executive director, sat through the entire meeting without being asked to provide her perspective on the sign ordinance. Our community’s foremost expert on the issues associated with sign blight had just wasted her (taxpayer-funded) time sitting through the meeting with no apparent purpose.
And finally, Gary Willis – who says he had an inherent issue on proposed changes to the sign code after spending $30,000 on an electronic sign – asked that he or another affected business owner be appointed to the task force.
Willis and I and others in the room were surprised to learn from Brown that Willis’ interests were being represented on the task force by Phil Cannon, who chairs the downtown merchants association. Huh?
Willis says he doesn’t know Cannon, and that Cannon certainly couldn’t represent his perspective on the task force. Besides, Cannon, an attorney who was in a deposition instead, wasn’t even at the task force meeting because Brown didn’t bother checking his schedule beforehand.
Yet, Willis’ request was denied.
“And the sign said everybody welcome, come in, kneel down and pray But when they passed around the plate at the end of it all, I didn’t have a penny to pay, so I got me a pen and a paper and I made up my own little sign I said thank you Lord for thinking about me, I’m alive and doing fine.”
At the meeting’s end, it was time to compare calendars and collectively determine an ideal time to reconvene before the City Commission’s Jan. 22 meeting, at which – Brown says – a new sign code will be adopted. (Surely, he jests.)
No dice. A meeting time and date will be announced, the task force was told.
The city isn’t about to make the same mistake twice.
It’s apparent that this task force won’t be asked for its collective recommendation – even on a meeting time.