Description
Applicant:City of Woodland
The City of Woodland is looking to update its sign regulations to keep up with changes in legal precedents and free speech laws.
In 2015, the US Supreme Court issued the Reed Vs. Gilbert AZ decision which determined that the regulation of temporary signs could violate free speech under the first amendment. Specifically that temporary signs could not be treated differently based on their content. (Content being the information made available or the material dealt with, by the sign.) In other words, while the city can regulate issues like the location, size, height, location, and the number of signs, the city COULD NOT regulate the information signs contain. For example, we cannot regulate "political" signs, "ideological" signs, or "directional" signs. By definition, those signs are all categorized by their content.
In 2022, the US Supreme Court narrowed the Reed Vs. Gilbert ruling when they ruled that while jurisdictions COULD NOT regulate based on content (which requires you to ask "Who is the speaker?" and "What are they saying?") jurisdictions COULD ask "Who is the speaker?" and "Where are they saying it?"
This opens the door for regulating on-site signs and off-site signs. While this does require the jurisdiction to read the content of the sign in order to regulate the sign, it is not about the content of the sign, it is about the location of the sign.
Sign Code Update
This effort will be complex due to the legal issues involved. Because of this, staff has developed a first draft analysis of WMC 17.52 which is attached below. This draft is dated August 13th, 2024 and includes staff's proposed code changes, internal conversations, and identifies policy issues it thinks will need to be discussed. Subsequent versions of the analysis will emerge as the discussion progresses and they will be made available below.
In anticipation of this complex discussion, two hearings have been initially been scheduled for September and October of 2024 to ensure that the public has a chance to weigh in on this proposed code amendment.
Depending on how much progress is made at those meetings, additional meetings may be scheduled by the Planning Commission to ensure they are comfortable with making a recommendation to the city council.
Code Change Process
The Planning Commission's responsibility is to make a recommendation on any policy changes that it feels are needed to the city code. This recommendation will include both a letter of recommendation, and also a draft ordinance that outlines specific recommended code changes.
The Council may choose to consider the ordinance without an additional public hearing, or, it may choose to hold additional public hearings to consider additional testimony from the public, before they consider the proposed ordinance.
Watch here for additional information regarding the code update process and the schedule for the process. Thank you.