Pocono, PA -local comments on Digital Billboards

Review sign rules before it's too late

March 28, 2007

Municipal officials, take note. If you don't attend to your sign ordinances you will have signs you don't want and the wrath of the public as well. And no help from the courts or state agencies in controlling them.If the flashing electronic billboard at the Crossroads site in Bartonsville hasn't rattled people into action yet, the proposed electronic billboard that Mount Airy Resort and Casino wants on Route 611 should. And these are only two of the controversial signs that have piqued local interest and chagrin in recent months.Before the Crossroads sign plugged into the grid along Interstate 80 without a required state permit, Pocono Township tried to stop an earlier electronic sign at another location, and failed. Last summer the township issued a cease-and-desist order after discovering the owner of an existing Route 611 billboard was converting it to an electronic tri-vision sign. Pocono requires approval before sign owners can modify or expand an existing non-conforming sign. However, a Monroe County Court judge denied the order. He ruled that converting a traditional billboard into a changing, three-message board was "an incidental alteration because it does not change the original dimensions, purpose or function of the original sign in any way."Yet another sign that evaded residents' radar is a tall lighted billboard alongside I-80 in Delaware Water Gap. The sign passed official muster without input from neighbors, who are now complaining about the light shining on their properties.Now Mount Airy casino officials are proposing a 12- by 15-foot sign with a video screen with light-emitting diode or LED technology. They want to put the sign along Route 611 at Woodland Road, which leads to the under-construction slots resort. Paradise Township's sign ordinance does not address electronic signs.Close to 400 electronic billboards now dot the nation's landscape, including Monroe County. Savvy sign companies know just how to place them and where sign rules are lax, unenforced or even welcoming. Many local residents consider the signs offensive, out of keeping with the Poconos' rural character. Others consider them so distracting as to constitute driving hazards. However, so far PennDOT and the Monroe County Court have turned a blind eye.Thus, municipal officials in fast-growing, fast-changing Monroe County must review their ordinances now, specifically addressing electronic, lighted or moving signs. And they must enforce their own rules. No one else is going to do it for them.

Source : Pocono Record