Discussion continues on rules for electronic message signs
Talks have resumed on a topic Lansdale has discussed at length in recent years: electronic message signs.
Assistant Borough Manager John Ernst said this week he’d like borough officials to consider revisiting the questions of whether, and where, those signs should be allowed.
“What I’m suggesting we start discussion on would be expanding the use of these signs, to include not only the industrial district, but the uses that would be religious and institutional,” Ernst said.
Electronic message signs have been a topic of discussion for nearly a decade now, and new ones were banned in the borough from 2009 to 2014, but two were allowed as replacements for previously existing signs at Lansdale Catholic High School and First Baptist Church. In 2014, the borough’s planning commission and council changed codes to allow the electronic message signs, but only in the town’s industrial zone, and a challenge to that new rule soon followed.
In late 2015, Lansdale United Methodist Church began making its case to council for their own sign, and council initially opposed the request before voting to lift their opposition in May of 2016. The borough zoning hearing board then voted to deny the church’s request, and the church responded by challenging that ruling in court — a court case Ernst said this week has now been dropped.
“To make a long story short, Lansdale United
Methodist Church has withdrawn their appeal of the zoning board decision,” Ernst said.
“With that, we had initially talked about, if that appeal were to be withdrawn, then we as a planning commission would begin discussions about opening up the locations, or the use groups, for where these digital message boards could be used,” he said.
The Lansdale Catholic and First Baptist signs both qualify as religious uses, and a new electronic sign at Eighth Street and Cannon Avenue falls within the industrial zoning, Ernst said. Would the commission, and ultimately council, be open to seeing those signs elsewhere?
“I think, as part of the last discussion, we were trying to keep them out of the Main Street, downtown business area,” said commission member John Chirico.
Could religious uses be allowed, but not on Main Street?
“While I’m not a lawyer, I would at least suggest that if you allow religious uses in one part of the district, and don’t allow religious uses in another part, we would certainly open ourselves up for a lawsuit,” Ernst said.
What if a church is located on Main Street, but close to the downtown business area, like St. John’s United Church of Christ at Main and Richardson Avenue?
“If we open up something like changeable signs to very specific uses like this, that puts us in a very tenuous position should a commercial use come in,” said commissaries member Nate Burns.
“Let’s say we get a changeable sign on main Street for St. John’s, and a commercial use says ‘Well, you let them have it,’” he said.
The use asking for the sign may different, Burns said, but an applicant could argue that the sign’s impact on the community and its visibility to drivers would be no different whether it’s placed in front of a religious use or a commercial one.
“If I were a business owner across the street from a church which had a variable message sign on it, I would say ‘I’d like relief from the zoning board on this, because you’ve allowed my neighbor directly across the street from me to have this,’” he said.
Commission member Kevin Dunigan said if changes are made, he could see applicants trying to claim their business has some sort of religious or institutional angle.
“I personally think we ought to stay away from it, and leave it alone,” Dunigan said.
And what if a building initially houses an institutional or religious use and then is sold?
“Do we have now a grandfathered changeable message sign out there? Obviously, St. John’s and Lansdale Catholic are not going to do that, but there are institutional uses throughout this borough that could very well pick up and move their facility, and at that point we have a new problem on our hands,” said Dunigan.
Ernst said he’ll discuss those questions and possible updates with the borough solicitor and the borough’s liaisons to the Montgomery County Planning Commission, and talks will continue at future borough planning commission meetings. Lansdale’s planning commission next meets at 7:30 p.m. on April 17 and borough council next meets at 9 p.m., with council’s Code committee meeting at 8 p.m., on April 5. All meetings will be held at the borough municipal building, 1 Vine St. For more information or meeting agendas and materials visit www. Lansdale.org or follow @ LansdalePA on Twitter.