I am not so naive as to believe we can all agree on this – but I am very pleased that the Ulman administration has taken decisive action on the proliferation of illegal sign litter in the county.
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/howard/bal-ho.signs24oct24,0,6894155.story
The scofflaws who plant their commercial enterprise signs on public and private property offend me on many levels. Not only are they unsightly and a litter problem, and the periodic cleanup a waste of community resources – but this illegal, uncompensated use of other people’s property provides an unfair business advantage to the offenders.
For those who are not engaged in business in HoCo, you may be surprised to learn that permits are required for most signs – and there are fairly stringent rules about how big, how many, what materials, and where they can be placed.
The folks quoted in the Sun article who say they didn’t know about the laws, or just did what they saw other people doing have got to be kidding. If they really don’t have enough sense to know that you can’t just conduct your business affairs on other peoples property, then we should question what other laws they don’t understand. I therefore am making the following suggestion:
Not only should the businesses whose signs have been collected in this sweep be fined according to the law – but the they should also be referred to the enforcement divisions of all the other permit, licensing, taxing, zoning and compliance offices that would normally be required for their posted businesses.
Sound harsh? I suppose.
It is very hard to be a small business person. The paperwork will kill you. However, as long as the laws and rules are in place and the rest of the businesses are spending their time and resources complying with them – then everyone must.
Now, if these folks want to put some time and effort into changing the rules to make it easier for small businesses to thrive without being run out of business by government paperwork …..
Cindy Vaillancourt
ps – while they are cleaning up the illegal signs – let’s not forget the huge commercial real estate signs erected on sites where no property is available.
