City and county leaders have approved changes to a zoning ordinance related to signs and their content due to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling.
Amendments within the ordinance, which covers the City of Columbus and Bartholomew County, were made to language and the methods that are used to regulate signs, said Jeff Bergman, planning director with the city-county planning department.
“It’s really an exercise in updating the terms that are used and the methodology to make sure we’re consistent with court rulings and decisions,” Bergman said.
That was done among four local government entities all in a single day — Monday. Changes to the ordinance went into effect immediately as a result of the votes.
The U.S. Supreme Court had taken up the case, Reed v. Town of Gilbert, Arizona, after a pastor of a local church sued the town and claimed its regulation of temporary directional signs for the church violated the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment to free speech, Bergman said.
The Arizona town’s sign regulations — which the Supreme Court ruled on three years ago — treated different types of non-commercial speech differently, he said.
Bartholomew County governing bodies took the local ordinance created in 1998 and made changes to the language involving political/expression signs. Instead of a political sign category, the amended ordinance will replace that with non-commercial messages, Bergman said.
“We need to avoid the possible implication that those signs are limited to political candidates,” he said.
Non-commercial messages are described as those that convey an opinion or information regarding an issue, an event that is not commerce-related or to otherwise provide a means of personal expression, according to the zoning ordinance.
Columbus City Council and Bartholomew County Commissioners both passed changes to the ordinance on Monday. The city and county plan commissions unanimously recommended approval of the amended ordinance earlier in the day.
The changes won’t affect how businesses and individuals use signs in Columbus and Bartholomew County, Bergman said. No modifications have been made to the allowed number, height or area of signs for businesses, he said.
Bergman said the U.S. Supreme Court case left it up to cities to look at their regulations and make changes. Lower court decisions have also clarified how the 2015 decision will be interpreted and applied.
“We need to make sure we’re not regulating based on content or implied we’re regulating on content,” Bergman said.
More changes to the ordinance will be considered later this year to address specific topics such as sign illumination, said Melissa Begley, assistant planning director with the city-county planning department. Public input will be sought as part of those proposed changes, she said.
