Regina city council will receive a report from administration some time in the new year focused on regulations on sign bylaws previously approved by council.
Since the current bylaw was passed in August, portable sign companies in Regina have said the new rules have been devastating to their business, and approached council Monday night to say just that.
Mayor Michael Fougere said he realizes there’s unfairness in the bylaw as it stands.
“I can understand the issue of the visual clutter, that would be a concern before both the permanent billboards and the animated billboards, and then the portable signs too,” Fougere said. “We need to look at the entire industry and say, ‘what can we do to make it easier or more rational?’ I think that’s part of the wider discussion.”
Fougere said there’s some clarity issues to council on the bylaw.
“There’s no regulation on where they go and how many we can have, there may be something administrative, but nothing apparent to council,” Fougere said. “There are I think five in the last six months or so that have been put up, and so we don’t say they’re necessarily wrong, but what’s the policy for that? Do we restrict them somehow? Do we say a certain number per kilometer? I’m not sure.”
Fougere said members of the public have approached him about the number of signs up in the city.
“Particularly with the portable signs, and years ago, it was actually worse than it is right now, the regime we put in place I think has worked well so I don’t know why we wanted to make the change in the first place, that’s my own feeling,” Fougere said. “The larger signs, the permanent signs, and the electronic signs, there’s more than ever before, and people aren’t complaining but they have said ‘we have more signs in the city than ever before.’”
Administration’s recommendations could return the sign bylaws to the way they were before, which would address the concerns of the delegations that came forward.
