Council signs on to billboard ban

Dan Kulin

Thursday, Aug. 19, 2004 | 9:45 a.m.

Billboard companies looking for sites for new signs probably shouldn't look to North Las Vegas anymore.

Shunned by the Clark County Commission earlier this year, billboards took another hit Wednesday when the North Las Vegas City Council voted 5-0 to have city staff draft a law prohibiting new billboards in the city.

The action comes almost four months after the County Commission voted to ban billboards from unincorporated lands outside the county's cities, except along Interstate 15 north of the North Las Vegas city line.

North Las Vegas Mayor Michael Montandon has long opposed any new billboards coming to the city and routinely votes against billboard applications.

The mayor calls the signs "vertical pollution," and his fellow council members agreed Wednesday night, as Montandon's call for a law to ban new billboards was unanimously supported.

City Manager Gregory Rose said it takes typically 30 to 60 days to draft a new law, but he said this matter could come back to the council sooner.

During the Wednesday council discussion of billboards in the city, Councilwoman Stephanie Smith questioned whether the city could legally ban all new billboards. Smith said maybe the council should instead limit new billboards to one a year.

But Senior Deputy City Attorney Jim Lewis said the city attorney's office believes such a prohibition on new billboards could be successfully defended in court so long as the council does not make any special exceptions to individual developers.

There are 122 billboards in North Las Vegas now. Another five billboards have been approved but not built yet. There are also four pending applications for billboards.

The pending applications and any applications the city receives before a ban is approved by the council would not fall under the prohibition, city Planning Director Jory Stewart said.

Attorney Bob Gronauer, the attorney for two of the pending billboard applications, said he would have to see the specific language in a proposed law before commenting on the matter.

The county ban was supported by many residents, who complained about the proliferation of billboards and the sometimes racy content of the signs.

But some in the billboard industry said the county law would reduce competition and put small local billboard companies out of business.