SB 495

This bill declares certain outdoor advertising signs along highways to be

nonconforming, but does not require the signs to be removed unless certain criteria

are met.

The federal Highway Beautification Act requires states to restrict advertising

along interstate and federal-aid primary highways, and current state law

incorporates these requirements. Current law prohibits, with certain exceptions,

the erection or maintenance of outdoor advertising signs within 660 feet of, or

otherwise visible (and intended to be visible) from, the main-traveled way of an

interstate or federal-aid primary highway. However, various exceptions apply to

this prohibition, including exceptions for the following: 1) signs advertising

activities conducted on the property on which the sign is located (on-property signs)

if certain conditions are met; 2) signs in business areas if certain conditions are met

or the signs were erected before March 19, 1972 (business area signs); 3) directional

and other official signs meeting certain criteria (directional signs); and 4) certain

signs located more than 660 feet from the highway (signs outside the adjacent area).

Under current law, the Department of Transportation generally may remove

signs that do not conform to applicable requirements but, for each sign removed,

must pay just compensation to the owner of the sign and to the owner of the land on

which the sign is located. For on-property signs, if the on-property sign was lawful

when it was erected but later does not comply with the applicable requirements for

on-property signs, DOT must declare the sign to be nonconforming but may not

remove the sign unless additional criteria are met. These signs are not subject to

removal for changing the advertising message on the sign or performing customary

maintenance on the sign, but are subject to removal, without compensation, if the

sign is enlarged, replaced, or relocated or if additional signs are erected. For signs

lawfully erected after March 18, 1972, which subsequently become nonconforming,

DOT must require removal of the signs, with compensation, by the end of the fifth

year after they become nonconforming, but only if there are sufficient funds available

to DOT to pay just compensation for the sign removal.

Under this bill, business area signs, directional signs, and signs outside the

adjacent area (together referred to as off-property signs) that were lawfully erected

but that no longer conform to applicable requirements must be declared

nonconforming but are not subject to removal unless additional criteria are met.

These nonconforming off-property signs are not subject to removal for changing the

advertising message on the sign or performing customary maintenance on the sign.

These signs must remain substantially the same as they were on the date they

became nonconforming in order to be exempt from removal by DOT although they

can have an extension temporarily attached to the sign face if certain conditions are

met. “Substantially the same" is defined to mean that, since the sign became

nonconforming, no “substantial change" to the sign has been made. “Substantial